By Tammy Uhl
In July 2011, at my first routine mammogram at the age of 40, my healthcare team said there was a calcification they wanted to keep an eye on and asked that I have a mammogram every six months. I discovered a lump in my breast in June 2013, but I was scheduled for a six-month mammogram in July, so I knew they would look at it then. At that July appointment, they said all was clear, and I could go to once-a-year mammograms from there on out.
At a routine physical six months later, I asked my primary care physician about the lump, which now was visible on my skin. She looked back at the images from the mammogram and said there was nothing abnormal there so it most likely was a benign cyst, which I could get drained if I wanted to.
I decided to make an appointment with the surgeon to get that accomplished so I wouldn’t be bothered by it any longer. When the surgeon inserted the needle to drain it, he said there wasn’t any fluid to be drained. He was very confident it was a fibroadenoma, but wanted to do a biopsy just to be certain.
When we met at the hospital the following week, the mood was light as we were told it was nothing to worry about, and the surgeon even said he would make sure the biopsy scar was done in such a way that it would be hard to see after it healed. He had arranged for a pathologist to be in the operating room so we would not have to wait for the results, and I was put under for a short nap.
When I woke up from the biopsy procedure, the anesthesiologist was sitting next to my bed holding my hand, which I knew was not at all the norm. I looked out the sliding glass door of the room and saw the surgeon talking to my husband. As soon as I focused in on my husband’s face, I immediately knew it was not good news.
On February 18, 2014, at the age of 42, I was a wife of 17 years, a mom to three young children, and I was diagnosed with breast cancer: Stage IIB IDC ER+, PR-, HER2-. I was an avid runner, watched what I ate, hardly ever drank, never smoked, and had no family history of breast cancer. And yet in the days that followed I learned I would need to have a mastectomy, chemotherapy, and radiation.
I had a unilateral mastectomy on March 13, 2014. On April 17, I had the first of four cycles of Taxotere and Cytoxan. On July 29, I began five weeks of radiation. When I eventually walked out of the radiation oncologist’s office on September 4, 2014, I was confident the worst was behind me.
I was reassured by all my doctors that I would one day look back at the entire experience as just a little bump in the road. I continued to go to the gym, challenging myself to remain physically strong. I continued to train for another race, as running was great medicine for my mental health. In June 2015, 15 months after my diagnosis, I ran another half marathon to celebrate the end of treatment. With active treatment completed, I was placed on Tamoxifen hormone therapy and continued with quarterly visits with my oncologist.
Then, in June 2017, I was experiencing severe back pain. My doctor was out of the office when I called, but a PA ordered a CT. She called me the next day to tell me I had a lesion at my L3 vertebra that was suspicious for metastatic disease. An MRI was performed several days later, and the radiologist felt that it was actually a vertebral hemangioma, which is a benign vascular lesion. I didn’t know the right questions to ask, specifically to demand a biopsy to know for certain, and off I went with a referral to physical therapy convinced that all was well.
In May 2018 I began losing weight, and over the next couple of months I lost over 30 pounds. My oncologist thought I was struggling emotionally with moving past my cancer diagnosis and that I should talk to someone for mental health support. I knew that wasn’t the issue, but I made an appointment with the oncology psychiatrist, and she told me there really wasn’t anything she could offer me as I seemed to be doing very well.
Fast forward to the start of COVID in March 2020. I could no longer go to the gym, so I was doing home workouts with my youngest daughter, who plays college basketball. I was also running quite a bit outdoors. I started to have knee pain, which I had experienced in my marathon training previously, and also assumed it was due to my trying to keep up with my 18-year-old daughter’s workouts.
In May 2020, my husband accepted a new job. Our family moved to a city 130 miles north, and I needed to establish new medical care. I mentioned to my new primary care provider that I was having quite a bit of knee pain, and off I went again to physical therapy.