The oncologist convinced me to wait a year before I decided to do the mastectomies, the year has come and gone and my mind is still made up. I have been doing research all year long trying to decide what to do. This was a big decision but I had my mind made up and my husband was 100% on board so that made the decision easy. I looked over the entire internet looking at different procedures trying to weigh all my options.
You would not believe all the choices for surgery’s and reconstruction. Even though I did make the decision to have the prophylactic bilateral mastectomies, which is removal of both breast even though there was not any cancer currently in them. I made this decision based on a few facts, the first was that comment my oncologist made the first time I met him. Another major reason that I wanted this done was because my tumor was good size and it did not show up on the mammogram and only showed as a cyst on the ultrasound. I have dense breast, which most ladies under 40 have dense breast tissue and it causes what I like to call bumpy boobs. Every time I did my self-exam I felt the bumps and worried that they were not just bumps but they were lumps.
When you live every day wondering if your cancer was coming back it is hard to live. Now that I made my choice it was time to convince a surgeon and my oncologist to do the procedures. You would think this was easy, how hard can it be to find a plastic surgeon in Dallas?
The first plastic surgeon I went to said that based on my age, the fact that there is no sign of cancer and that the surgery would be elective he had to go before the surgery review board to get it approved. I could not believe this I have to have a group of strangers decide if I can do what is my legal right to do. If I just wanted a tummy tuck, nose job or breast enlargement no review board, but for prophylactic mastectomies I do. This made no sense to me at all. Who gives them the right to tell me what I can and cannot do.