In-person group - Maryland

brig01

I've read posts on the breastcancer.org discussion boards ever since being diagnosed in 2012 but this will be my first post and I'm writing today in search of other women in my area (Baltimore, MD metro area) who might be interested in meeting in person. Several years ago, I had a bilateral mastectomy without reconstruction. I feel confident in my decision and don't regret it but I do feel isolated, alone, misunderstood, etc. I've read blogs, visited websites (breastfree.org, fit and fabulous), combed through book after book, searching for a sense of community. I've contacted several groups both national and local asking to be paired up with someone in a similar situation and spoke with two women by phone, but it just hasn't been enough. None of it has.

I've been to several different breast cancer support groups in my area and each time I sit and listen to women have lengthy and in depth discussions about various plastic surgeons' techniques and devising ways to deal with complications from reconstructive surgery, but almost no time is given to discussing what we are experiencing emotionally. Each time, after the meetings conclude many of the women gather in small groups to further discuss techniques for dealing with complications from their reconstructive surgery. There's more talk about mysterious rashes, oddly shaped or shifting implants, stick-on nipples, and insurance company battles. Not having anything to add to the conversation, I leave feeling slightly invisible.

In her book The Cancer Journals, Audrey Lorde wrote "I ached to talk to women about the experience I had just been through, and about what might be to come, and how were they doing it and how had they done it. But I needed to talk with women who shared at least some of my major concerns and beliefs and visions, who shared at least some of my language." She'd had a mastectomy without reconstruction and throughout her book she writes about the the frustration she felt at being told to cover up the fact that she had only one breast.

It's been more than thirty years since she wrote that and yet it seems that very little has changed. There are so many voices raised in the breast cancer survivor chorus but so few of them speak in a language that has been helpful or useful to me. In drastic contrast to the time when no one talked about cancer, it has now become derigueur to do so but the discussion has seemed incredibly one dimensional.

I'm tired of feeling like I'm the only person who opted to forgo reconstructive surgery and I'd like to speak with (not type at them or talk to them on the phone but actually sit down in a room and talk to) other women who have chosen a similar path. Perhaps we could meet as a group at a coffee shop or other public place, once or on a regular basis if it's helpful and talk to one another about how losing a breast (or breasts) has affected us emotionally, what ways we've been able to deal with those emotions (or not) and how we might be able to help one another.

If there are any other women who live in the Baltimore, MD metro area who would be interested in meeting in person to sit and chat, please contact me.

glennie19

I am too far away from you, but I hope you find some other Flat & Fabulous ladies to talk to.

BC2015

I have not had BX but feel for you and understand "feeling invisible". Had I decided to go that way, and should this spread I will make the choice you did. I would not go thru reconstruction. My husband supports me on that decision. I am in Mo. county, M

writinghelps

I feel ya' I'm in Maryland. About an hour from you.