Untitled Document

Andrea

I am 36 years old, have 4 children and married to Alan.

I have a huge history of Breast Cancer in my family, and my sister has suffered the disease twice. My sister, however, was told there was no fault found in BRAC1 & BRAC2; although there is a family fault, it is probably an unidentifiable gene at the moment. Therefore no genetic test was available to me.

My options were to have either yearly screening or I could have risk reducing surgery.
So, I chose the operation as I didn't want the fear of when I was going to be next.
In 2010 I had a scare in my underarm lymph nodes, and thankfully once removed and tested, all was clear.
This then made the decision all the more easier to have the operation.

Andrea I am 36 years old, have 4 children and married to Alan. I have a huge history of Breast Cancer in my family, and my sister has suffered the disease twice. My sister, however, was told there was no fault found in BRAC1 & BRAC2; although there is a family fault, it is probably an unidentifiable gene at the moment. Therefore no genetic test was available to me. My options were to have either yearly screening or I could have risk reducing surgery. So, I chose the operation as I didn't want the fear of when I was going to be next. In 2010 I had a scare in my underarm lymph nodes, and thankfully once removed and tested, all was clear. This then made the decision all the more easier to have the operation.

Day before surgery	24 hours post op

12 days post op	4 weeks postop

11 weeks postop before expansion	week 12. 1st expansion

2nd Expansion	6 months post op
I am very grateful to my surgeon Mr Andrew Baildam for giving me the chance to be there a little while longer with my children. I wasn't brave enough to face what my sister went through, so don't really feel I have the right to be called brave for having this operation.