Hi hoopla

i was diagnosed with pre cancer cells last February. Although the word pre cancer is the wrong definition of what we have as there is no guarantee that these cells will become cancerous.  You don’t go into any detail but I guess you have cells in situ; either lobular or ductal? 

What grade are the cells? Are they wide spread? What justification is there for a mastectomy rather than lumpectomy?

Hi M, thanks for replying!

It's ductal, and they need to remove the whole breast because there are quite a lot of them over a large area. 

Mine was ductal (DCIS) but not widespread like yours. I had a wide local excision (lumpectomy) followed by a course of radiotherapy.

The thing to remember with DCIS is it's non invasive, totally contained in the milk duct and not life threatening. I never lost sight of these facts. It has a 99% survival rate after 10 years.

It is graded low, medium and high. Mine was high grade hence the radiotherapy. If it's low, as I understand it, they often just do the surgery with no following treatment. 

Mine was picked up on a mammogram otherwise I wouldn't have known about it. This type of cancer is caught very early and is totally treatable.

Do exactly what you are doing now and take one day at a time. I wish you luck for your op and yes that could quite well be it

I have an amazing medical team and I totally trusted them. I now know that I can contact them at any time if I have the slightest worry and the reassurance of annual mammograms for 5 years.

Just a few months after my treatment finished (March) I'm feeling fit, healthy and cured

Irene, thank you so much for your kind words, just knowing I'm not alone is helping. They didn't mention grade but they just said they had to take away the whole breast because of the scale of it. I'm very glad to hear you are doing so well, brilliant news  

Hi Hoopla

I was diagnosed with high grade dcis at the beginning of August. I need a mastectomy too and finally coming to terms with it by finding out as much as I can about reconstructions. At least you can go to your appointments informed.

DCIS means the pre cancerous cells are surrounded by their own “bubble” and are not invasive elsewhere in the body.

it just seems so long between appointments. 

Good luck with what reconstruction you decide 

Thank you Joolz, I'm sorry you're going through this too. It's just so scary. Thanks for the reassurance about the cells not being anywhere else, my anxiety riddled brain keeps worrying that I'll deal with this and then something else will pop up. I too like to read up, it's the only reason the news that I needed a mastectomy didn't come as a bigger shock than it already did. But I'm finding it hard to read about the actual surgery, it sounds so brutal. I have three children and I'm petrified I'm going to die and leave them. 

Thanks Joolz, loving your treat idea. My husband is a mini fanatic/mechanic so if you need any advice when the time comes just shout! Hope you've got a good support network for you and your two. 

Hi Hoopla

You are lucky to have a loving husband and you’ll get through it with his help. My boyfriend sent me a sorry I can’t do this text 2 weeks ago and that was the last I heard from him. To be fair that made me snap out of feeling sad and doing research instead. 

I have a lot of true reliable friends I can count on and some time off work to look forward to after my op. 

Are you kidding me? That's unbelievable, what a cowardly piece of effluence! Thank God you have real friends to support you, they'll be worth their weight in gold.