Hello, I am facing a choice between tamoxifen or surgery to reduce the risk of developing breast cancer and I am interested in hearing other people's experiences.

My mum died at 48 from breast ca and as she was adopted (no other females in my family) I was told by the genetics team that genetic testing wasn't viable for me, even though I would have paid privately for it.

Fast forward 5 years and I traced my mums (wonderful) birth family and discovered that out of 7 females 5 had breast cancer with 3 deaths. I went straight back to the family history clinic and am now high risk. The genetics team are doing more work on the nature of my family cancers ( love the NHS!) but the Nightingale centre have asked me to consider tamoxifen or surgery to reduce my risk.

Tamoxifen is a harsh drug and I've read a lot about the side effects. I'm wondering if a bilateral mastectomy and reconstructions will not only reduce my risk but reduce the anxiety around checking, screening, wondering in the future?

thank you reading my post, I'm trying to educate myself as much as possible before my chat with doctors and would like to hear anyone's experience of both xx