Living with breast cancer in my twenties

So, I turned 40 a month ago and am now officially 11 years cancer free. That’s a pretty huge achievement for me considering I've nearly died a few times. As you can imagine, being diagnosed with cancer felt like the worst day of my life. I didn't necessarily think I was going to die though, I had too much of an 'I'm invincible attitude'. It was the the treatment and losing my breast that scared me the most. Birthday photos It's been a very very long journey. People assume cancer ends the day it's been taken out and you're in remission. It's definitly not. You're left with emotional pain that people can't see. If I could turn back the clock I would have dived straight into therapy. It wasn't necessarily just to talk about cancer but all the emotional pain and trauma I had before, which I believe contributed massively to me developing breast cancer. I started my self healing journey four years ago. I did well to begin with and figured...

I finally had my appointment with my surgeon to discuss my implant options and it didn't go quite how I expected. Leading up to the appointment I had decided I wanted safer implants put in for the time being as I didn't feel quite ready to go flat yet. I figured I'd get on the waiting list and have surgery in about 6-9 months. I'd come home in the new year, work, save, have the surgery and head off again. My surgeon went through my options and it wasn't as simple as I'd hoped. One common problem with breast implants is the development of capsular contracture, a condition in which the scar tissue that forms around the implant becomes hard. Scar tissue is the body's natural response to the presence of any foreign body. With breast implants, the body creates a barrier of scar tissue around the implant to wall it off and protect it from the rest of the body. This is called a capsule. What I didn't realise is that this capsule makes the surgery far more c...