Did you know that there are different types of breast cancer?
Did you know that you can have breast cancer without having a lump?
Did you know that all breast cancers do not show up on a mammogram or an ultrasound?
Have you ever heard of Inflammatory Breast Cancer?
Nina Anderson, the author of this book, would have answered "no" to all of the above questions. If she had known some of these facts, she would have been more suspicious about her symptoms. She was a very health conscious individual. She had a mammogram and Pap test every year and did monthly self breast examinations. When she started having swelling, an inverted nipple, redness and a fever in her right breast, the last thing she ever suspected was that she might have breast cancer. She had hardly ever been sick in her entire life until she was diagnosed with this very aggressive and lethal form of breast cancer known as Inflammatory Breast Cancer. This book is the story of her dreadful ordeal and miraculous survival.
Nina considers the sequence of events that led to her early diagnosis a miracle that saved her life. Many women do not survive IBC because there is no lump involved and it cannot be detected by a mammogram or ultrasound. The only way to get a conclusive diagnosis is to perform a surgical biopsy of the breast and skin tissue. The symptoms of Inflammatory Breast Cancer (abbreviated as IBC) are similar to a breast infection known as mastitis. Most women are diagnosed with mastitis or cellulitis and treated with antibiotics for two to three months. By that time IBC is so aggressive that it has spread to other organs of the body and is in the final stage of breast cancer. The details of her diagnosis and the eleven months of treatment that followed are chronicled in this amazing story of survival.
During her very first chemotherapy treatment, an incident involving a bumble bee instilled a hope in Nina that would help to sustain her during the long, grueling months of treatment. She shares her experience in an effort to inform every woman about the symptoms of Inflammatory Breast Cancer and how to cope and fight the disease. It is her hope that this book will save lives. No woman should have to suffer the consequences of this disease because she has never heard of IBC or didn't know about the symptoms. Nina also wants to give every woman who is diagnosed with IBC the hope that YOU CAN SURVIVE.
Here is an excerpt from her book:
CHAPTER ONE - THE MONTH OF APRIL
RARE ENCOUNTERS OF THE INTIMATE KIND
You know how when you get past fifty years old, those intimate moments with your spouse are few and far between? Well that's kind of how it was with us. But it was one of those rare evenings when things just seemed to fall in place and it happened! Afterwards my husband, Richard, said that something wasn't right with my right breast. I told him that I had already noticed it and that I thought I might have mastitis. He had no idea what that was, so I explained that it was an infection of the mammary glands which you can sometimes have when you are breastfeeding. I had some redness and swelling and the breast had felt kind of feverish for about a week or two. I told him I guess I would have to make an appointment with my gynecologist and get some antibiotics. It was kind of aggravating to be going through menopause and have to deal with a breast infection. I promised that as much as I hated going to the doctor, I would make an appointment the next day.
When I woke up the next morning, the breast was so swollen that the nipple had inverted. I remembered when I was breast feeding that this same thing had happened when it was feeding time. The breasts would fill with milk and the right nipple would become an "inny" instead of an "outy." I would have to use a nipple shield in order for the baby to be able to nurse. So an inverted
