Author’s Note: I’m releasing a series of posts around the procedure I’m currently undergoing. All of these were written before the surgery. Your responses at the bottom—and my recover—will fuel upcoming posts. Thanks for taking this leap with me!
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I am a perfectly healthy* woman. All my tests look good, and my fitness level is excellent. There is an asterisk there because my body is healthy, but my genes are a little weird, it turns out.
I have the BRCA 1 gene mutation.
If you don’t know, BRCA puts me at a dramatically increased risk of breast and ovarian cancer, plus a few others. I found this out almost two years ago. Getting the news was bizarre. It’s bad news… but then again, nothing had changed. I was exactly the same person I’d always been, just a few moments older. I wasn’t sick. Hadn’t developed a sudden condition. I was just me—only with new information.
This information has led me to a decision. As a perfectly healthy woman with perfectly normal results on her MRIs and mammograms, I am having a bilateral mastectomy with reconstruction. As a person who never even had her wisdom teeth out, my first introduction to anesthesia will be an 8-hour procedure followed by six weeks of recovery.
Diving into the deep end, you could say. Typical me!
I want to talk about this process, why I’m doing it, and how it feels. I want to talk about it now, while everything is status quo. I want to talk about it after, when I’m raw and freshly acclimating to my new body. And I want to talk about it much later, when the dust settles and I have hindsight. There is much I don’t know yet, but much I’m feeling already. I think all of it bears discussion.
This is not a narrative about breast cancer. There are many of those, and they are worthy of hearing. This will be a journey with my body. A look at choices made and changes accepted. And it will be a raw and blunt (sometimes) discussion of topics that we often whisper about at best.
I don’t think we should whisper. I think we should talk. I think we should get over whatever it was that told us to be ashamed of our bodies, our wants, our fears, and our needs. I think we should ask the questions and get answers.
On that note, heads up! The reflection questions at the bottom invite you to click a google form and (totally anonymously) add your thoughts. They will not only comfort me on my journey, they will inspire future writing!
We all have bodies. We all have wants and weird stuff and wishes. Let’s talk about it. Why the hell not?
I’ll get to the mastectomy in a bit. Next, let me introduce you to what I call The Dragon.
YOUR TURN:
1. List three or more questions you’ve always wanted to ask but felt like they were “taboo.” Anonymously add them to my Google form.
1A. Not into modesty? Write down three things you love and two things you “hate” about your physical self. Option to add that instead!
2. Who would you share this with if you felt like you wouldn’t be judged?
3. Re-read your list. Say the words aloud to yourself. Sit with the feeling these words give you. Then write out what’s on your mind.
Skye your amazing woman very strong its been awhile but your in my thoughts and prayers always