Need a reality check!

Brooklyn1234

Hi everyone,

It's been a while!

I'm five years out, and am now going through a cancer scare in my other breast. I always got an ultrasound with my mammo, but that stopped when I moved to Canada 2.5 years ago. The (major research) hospital I'm at told me ultrasound isn't used as a general detection tool, only to 'spot check' trouble areas. They told me I only had 50 percent tissue density, so no need to worry, yearly mammo would be fine. But I did worry because I have also been told at times in the past that I have very dense tissue (I've been told both). I don't know if density can change, or what. But I get told different things about that at different times. Anyway, I ended up qualifying for a program to give me an MRI for the first time in 2.5 years, and sure enough, they found two masses not detected on the mammo, and they reported that my breast tissue is incredibly dense. Now I'm being given the ^&*%* ultrasound. One of the masses is half a cm and doesn't look too suspicious. The other one is .7 cm and they're hoping it's just a lymph node. Apparently it's too tough to know because of my incredible breast density. This is terrifying, and seems to me like it all could have been avoided if they had just given me the ultrasound with the mammo all along. Now my biopsy is in a few days, and i just keep thinking about my young child, and how I'll have to go through chemo again etc. I'm so angry because it seems that for 2.5 years my breast has basically gone unmonitored. Nobody listened to me, they acted like it was a bizarre suggestion that I receive an US. I'm also mad at myself that I didn't push for what I needed. What I'm wondering is: am I thinking rationally about this? Was a yearly mammo really like no monitoring at all? Does .7 cm definitely mean chemo? At that size, this was still caught early, right? Thank you for any responses you can give!

farmerlucy

Brooklyn - So sorry for the angst. Remember - don't go there 'til you get there. If your breasts are extremely dense chances are an ultrasound may not have found it. MRI is the gold standard for dense breasts but it is also notorious for false positives. The size you mentioned is definitely small, and I would imagine further tests like the Oncotypedx would be done (assuming hormone pos) to determine the need for chemo IF the biopsy proves positive. Hang in there. One step at a time.