ALH

Msespo1765

I'm new to this forum, I'm hear because I was newly diagnosed with ALH during a removal of 2 fibroadenomas. No cancer or pre-cancer my surgeon says, but a marker for the risk of cancer in the future. This diagnosis was a month ago. No immediate breast cancer in my family..I'm 55 still struggling to get to menopause! I met with my oncologist first time on Thursday, she was very informative, sweet & convincing about me starting tamoxifen for 5 years. I have never heard of any of this and I have been in a complete panic/anxiety attack since googling & reading reviews!! I haven't slept past few nights my mind is going crazy. I'm trying not to let my family see how stressed I am. I can't decide if I want to start this Med, ask for an alternative, wait for menopause, ask for a hysterectomy so I can take a different med with less side effects! I go to Sydney Kimmel Breast center. I'm just trying to wrap my head around all this!! Thank you for listening/reading

Just had pap/annual was norm

wallycat

My twin (fraternal) had ALH found incidentally when having a breast reduction. She has taken nothing and is still OK (we have not spoken in 2 years, but her dx was at least 10-13 years ago). I was dx with lobular cancer 15 years ago...I took tamoxifen, then aromatase inhibitors and learned that tamoxifen doesn't do much for lobular.

If you want to hit menopause, take either of those (that's what happened to me, in any case). These drugs have side effects (yeah, who doesn't know, right?) .

Best to you.

Editing to add that I posted in the ILC and the Studies/current research tabs about the discovery that lobular cancer can actually feed on tamoxifen, so if you are opting for a treatment, and wanting to get into menopause, maybe they can discuss lupron (to shut ovaries down) and if you required, meds like aromatase inhibitors.