Mum has been diagnosed with breast cancer

Hi, my name is Gemma and me and my family have just very recently found out my mum has been diagnosed with breast cancer. My Mum is literally my best friend, so as you can imagine, it was absolutely heart wrenching finding out the news. It was completely unexpected. I guess I just wanted to know if there was anyone else on here that is going through the same thing, or similar. We have no history of breast cancer in our family, so we are going in blind. We are currently at the stage of waiting for her mri scan results. 

  • Hi Gemma and a warm welcome to our forum, 

    It must be such a heart-breaking time for you when it might feel like your world has suddenly been shattered and it was all completely unexpected. With your mum being your best friend, you must be quite devastated by the news of the diagnosis. There must also be a lot to take in following her diagnosis and I thought I would share with you the information we have on our website on breast cancer which will hopefully be helpful to you while you are waiting to find out more and are waiting for her MRI results. If you ever have any questions too, you are welcome to give our cancer nurses a call on 0808 800 4040 - their helpline is open Monday to Friday from 9am to 5pm. 

    You have come to the right place to meet others who have been diagnosed with breast cancer and I've had a little look on the forum for you for threads from members who were also diagnosed with breast cancer in recent weeks or days and found for example  who posted this thread and was diagnosed at the end of November - don't hesitate to drop this member a line if you would like to do so. Another thread you could respond to is  's who posted this thread on being diagnosed with breast cancer and you will see there are other members in that thread like   or  who responded with their own breast cancer experience. 

    I hope that you find out more soon about what your mum's staging and treatment plan is - do give us a little update if you get a chance and I hope that this forum will allow you to connect with others who find themselves in a similar place. 

    Best wishes, 

    Lucie, Cancer Chat Moderator 

  • Hi Gemma. 

    Sorry to hear about your Mum. 
    I am also the first in our family to have been diagnosed with Breast Cancer. I was extremely lucky and told pretty much straight away after my mammogram and ultrasound. I found the hardest part was waiting for the “plan” I didn’t know what to do with myself during that time. I have made inappropriate jokes all the way through this as a way of dealing with it. But also used it as a positive to keep going and fighting it. My daughter is currently expecting her first baby (due any day now) I am only 45 so my diagnosis was very unexpected. My only saving grace was that it was a prominent lump and I found it early. Still a grade 3 but small. Please feel free to reach out whenever you need to. It’s a tough thing to be going through but we are all on hand on to talk and chat xx

    sarah 

  • Hi Gemma so sorry to hear about your Mum. I have a 30year old Daughter and beautiful granddaughter and another on the way. It was really hard to tell my daughter my diagnosis as her father had just been diagnosed with Oesophagus cancer so it was double wammy for her. She has support from her partner I hope you have support from other family members? There is no history of breast cancer in our family either so it was a shock when I was diagnosed. 

    Please get all the support you can and maybe accompany your mam to appointments so you can hear what the treatment plan will be.

    I was diagnosed after a routine mammogram with Stage 1 breast cancer I underwent a lumpectomy and lymph node removal on 3rd January. I received my results recently on 22nd Jan and it was pretty good news the lump was only 9.2mm and my lymph nodes were clear. I have started on letrozole hormone medication and will need a course of 5 radiotherapy. 

    Breast cancer is very treatable if caught early so please try and stay positive and fingers crossed for your mum.

    Feel free to message with any questions or a chat