She didn’t find courage by being fearless; she saw it by showing up scared, asking for the next test, taking the next pill, and letting love and science carry her the rest of the way. At Christmas 2020, she chatted with her mom, herself a breast-cancer survivor, about an old friend who’d just faced something called triple-negative breast cancer. They googled it: an aggressive kind with no hormone targets, higher risk of spread, tough odds. Her mom said she’d never even heard of it during her own treatment.
They said a prayer and moved on. Weeks later, a cold February morning delivered the first real crack in the calm. She’d recently weaned her baby and noticed deep red blood, not milk. Assuming a clogged duct, she saw a lactation consultant. The LC’s face changed. A doctor came in, did an exam, and said, gently, “Don’t panic, but this kind of bleeding is never normal.” She was sent for urgent imaging.
She had known her breasts were dense and lumpy; that had confused past exams. Mammograms can miss tumors in thick tissue, and the standard “lie back” exam hadn’t found what only a leaned-forward palpation could. An ultrasound followed the mammogram this time, and the room got quiet. The head of breast imaging joined, recommended biopsies of three areas and a lymph node, and warned that the wait would be a couple of weeks. She sat with a simple, heavy thought: this isn’t good. At the breast surgeon’s office, a same-day biopsy offered a faster answer. The surgeon also ordered genetic testing. That night, trying to distract herself, she and her sister browsed TJ Maxx, where she whimsically bought a shower cap, never imagining chemo might make hair a non-issue.
Later, an email pinged: lab results posted to her old patient portal. Alone at home, she opened them. “Invasive ductal carcinoma.” Lots of “negative” markers underneath, then a friend in medicine delivered the hard translation over the phone: triple-negative breast cancer. She called her husband, asked him to keep the kids at his parents’ a little longer, then told her dad through tears. Her parents came over, and they combed through the report line by line, with Google as their guide.
The year that followed was a marathon of medicine and grit. Eight rounds of aggressive chemo. A double mastectomy with immediate reconstruction. Then, radiation, 28 daily drives with her dad became an unexpected treasure of conversations and perspective. Her husband drove her to every infusion and waited in parking lots because COVID rules kept him out. Friends threw a party before surgery and kept showing up with meals, jokes, and love.
She learned to claim small anchors. When sadness flared about breastfeeding not “saving” her, her dad said, “How do you know it didn’t? Maybe it kept things from being worse.” When she dreaded swallowing each oral-chemo pill, her physical therapist suggested thanking the medicine every morning. She did, and it helped. She’s not into toxic positivity; she calls those pushing it “cancer muggles”, but she believes in honest gratitude and the “silver linings” you only see on cloudy days.
She also became an advocate for better screening in dense breasts: after a mammogram, ask for an ultrasound of both sides. Don’t be shy. Push for answers if something feels off, bleeding, lumps, or pain. She wishes that had been the standard from the start. Ten months after diagnosis, she was still in active treatment, finishing radiation while on oral chemo, looking toward trials and hoping never to need more. She stays vigilant, self-checks, follows up, and makes a quiet promise to herself and her family. It’s been brutal and beautiful: brutal in the fatigue, fear, and losses; lovely in how people linked arms around her and in the clarity that followed.
What matters is embarrassingly simple now: her kids’ laughter, a long car ride with her dad, her husband’s hand on her back at the clinic door. She knows she was lucky to be held by a village and by science. And she knows another woman is out there right now, trying to decide whether to call the doctor. Her advice is uncomplicated: call. Ask for the ultrasound. Read the report. Bring someone who loves you. Then keep going.
