please stop minimizing my diagnosis

I agree.  While I know the docs want you to be positive for treatment and healing sake everytime I cried in front of them I felt guilty.  I felt like I shouldn't be crying because other people have it much worse.  I am thankful that I am cured.  But darn it, I didn't want to be a "breast cancer patient". 

Yay Melissa, so glad that you had clear margins and no node involvement!!

well I think that it is all perspective---but we are not lucky! I guess we are lucky if we don't need chemo- but lucky to have any CA? no- we are lucky if it is not invasive, but lucky to lose our breast/breasts? no- no luck there

I AGREE WITH YOU LUCK IS NOT WHAT I FELT OR FEEL, EXTREME EMOTIONAL UPHEAVAL, STRESS BEYOND COMPARE, CHOICES THAT WERE THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN MEDIEVAL AND BIZZARRE, FEAR OF SURGERY, CHEMO, RECONSTRUCTION, CHANGE IN DX AFTER PATH REPORT ..........NO LOTTERY WINNERS IN THAT PARAGRAPH!

Cheryl I am with you completely~ if they want to share in my luck I will donate my diseased breast to them as an implant so they can feel lucky too!

Wow, Anne, it is just amazing what some people will say..... if I had only known about imaging a light radiating down on my breast I wouldn't have needed the lumpectomy or be going through radiation treatments right now - sigh, just have to try to ignore people like that. I don't know much about alh, but it does sound kind of similar to DCIS in that it may or may not turn into something invasive in the future. I would recommend googling some info and maybe getting a second opinion before deciding what to do. This is a great site to get info and hopefully you will get a response from others that have more info for you.

I am so glad that my BS and PS didn't minimize my BC.  My original BS wanted to do a lumpetectomy and radiation.  I got gene tested and sought other opinions, switched surgeons and had a BMX.  I just really didn't want to deal with breast screenings and worrying the rest of my life.

Great info on the laws.  That should be posted somewhere. maybe it is???

I got a CA125 test today.  Lucky me - I get to check my ovaries, too!  That goes with the fun of having the BRCA1 mutation!  I had an U/S on my ovaries last month.  They looked okay.  Hopefully, nothing turns up.  I might have to get my ovaries taken out, too someday.

So - yes DCIS is cancer - it's real and people should never minimize it! 

No matter what stage our breast cancer is; we all heard the same four words:  "You have breast cancer".  Enough said. 

Barbiegirl~and to all

I just found this thread & want to say I agree with your orig. post.  I was dx'd w/ DCIS in July and had a unilat. MX  Aug.  My MX surgeon & my PS never have minimized my diagnosis but my oncologist did!!!   I was given only Tamoxifin as a follow up treatment...no chemo/rads... I met this oncologist once (once was enough) after my MX.  He said what I had was really "nothing"...not really enough to call it cancer.   Can you believe that!!!!  All I could think of, as I stared at him in disbelief that he was even saying this to me, is, "How could you say this to me?!!"..."How dare you say that what I went through was nothing!"  Yes, it was Stage 0 but I still had to have a MX and still had to go through the emotional "meltdowns" dealing with this whole journey!!!  I still have more surgeries to come!  It's a shame that there are people who downplay our condition just because we did not go through what other women do when they are diagnosed with more involved cancer.  CANCER is CANCER!

Okay...I feel better knowing that there are others who think like me...thanks!!!!

NAE

Bravo for this great thread!

When I was diagnosed with DCIS in March 2008 my internist/pathologist broke the bad news in a way that STILL irritates the s**t out of me almost two years later. She said, and I quote, "You have breast cancer....DCIS...Ductal Carcinoma in Situ...but it's good...it's really good!" At the time I was pretty well shell-shocked from the words "breast cancer" themselves, so it was hard for me to actually connect the dots together and compute that it was ostensibly a good diagnosis. I recall feeling as if I had some kind of mental disconnect going on because I couldn't wrap my brain around what she said at all. (How could breast cancer be good, I wondered...it was a diagnostic oxymoron as far as I was concerned.)  All I could think of were the words "breast cancer, breast cancer, breast cancer...", until I woke up from my momentary fog (a fog that felt like it was hours long when, in fact, it was probably about 5 minutes) and realized what she had said. I was furious. "WTF?", I thought to myself, "Breast cancer is good?! WTF kind of comment is that?" I thought she was an insensitive, self-centered b*tch and wanted to knock her clear across the room. How can you say something like that without realizing how insensitive and mean it comes across? I mean, honestly.

I remember looking up at her while she spoke ..uhhh babbled...onwardly, endlessly and relentlessly about my diagnosis, as if she were a robot gone out of control. She yammered on in medical jargon I was too overwhelmed to digest at the time, even though, as all of you know, I would come to know it well: MRIs and CATs scans, more diagnostic tests and procedures, oncologists and hematologists (especially her buddy she wanted me to see), my prognosis, negative and positive receptors, and treatment  options..blah blah..blah...meanwhile, I was sitting there seething with rage, the vulcano in my head about to explode.  In my best New York "attitude" self, I raised my right hand up and said, 'Whoa, whoa, whoa - slow down for a minute, please, okay?..So let me ask you something, Okay....Did you just tell me that I have breast cancer?"  She replied, "Why, yes, yes, I did". I turned to her and hissed, "Then tell me JUST HOW it is that breast cancer can be good because I DON'T THINK SO!" She looked stunned for a moment and then proceeded to explain what it meant. When I started to cry after realizing what I was up against, she told me, "No tears! No tears! It's all good! Positive energy and light!!" I was too tired to strangle her when she made that imbecilic remark, as if expecting me to jump for joy because I was diagnosed with cancer. This was not the f**king prom and I was not named Prom Queen. I had cancer and this was MY life, not hers.

Doctors need to understand that a cancer diagnosis - any kind of diagnosis at any stage - is a life changing event that should not be minimized for ANY ONE going through the process. Though the treatment modalities for those with advanced cancer are obviously more difficult than what someone with DCIS might go through, cancer is cancer period. DCIS is cancer and it still requires treatment of some kind, be it a lumpectomy, radiation treatment, Tamoxifen or Arimedex, a hysterectomy and salpingo-oophrectomy as in my case, and the treatment modalities are an assault on a person's body, spirit and mind.

DCIS Cancer has changed my life and my spirit in ways that I can't even articulate with any semblance of intelligence half the time. I AM a different person now and I think differently than I did before. My perceptions about my life - where I have been, where I am now and where I am going - touched me deeply and I know, without a shadow of a doubt, that I won't be the same person I was before.

 Here's to all of you..a toast to my sisters, the only ones who understand me.

Hi Sweetpea,

You hang in there and ''fight like a girl" At the end of the day people that maked comments likfe that just don't matter.

Hello All,

I have posted this on a new thread as well as here in hopes of getting some information.  I am hoping to get a few answers to some questions.  I recently found some abnormalities in my left breast that I had a b9 incisional biopsy on several years ago.I am 47 years old and have had two b9 lumpectomies over the course of 14 years one in either breast.  14 years ago the lumpectomy pathology report (which I was just able to retrieve from the surgeon)  read "breast showing focal moderate intraductal epithelial hyperplasia" - which from everything I've read is a good thing and "minute focus of atypical ductal hyperplasia involving one duct and multiple ductal cysts". - which from what I read now could possibly be not so good...also stated few ducts should moderate intraductal hyperplasia and one duct shows atypical hyperplasia.  I have dense breasts and see a breast surgeon annually for mammo.  It seems every year they do a US after the mammo and last year talk of a MRI was mentioned.  I have just recently received a copy of this pathology report...the breast surgeon I see has never seen this report but will this month... and since I had felt the same abnormalities as many years ago have become extremely anxious after reading this.  I have my annual dx mammo on 11/13 and will see the breast surgeon the same day as I do every year.  Even back when I had the lump removed I was told by the general surgeon that this would make me high risk and to watch closely.  I know a lot of progress has been made in diagnosing and treating ADH but I have also read that ADH and DCIS are very similar and can be mistakenly diagnosed.  Family history is not great...my dad's twin sister and my maternal great grandmother only.  Any input would be greatly appreciated.  Not totally stressed out yet but sure wish the 13th would get here soon.

I hope I am not being intrusive on your site but would sure appreciate your input.  Thanks for your help!

awb...thanks so much for the reply...I know 14 years seems like a long time ago but after reading everything I have read about DCIS and how slow growing it is and how some doctors don't even think it is cancer...just pre-cancer, especially back when.  Well, lets just say I'm glad I finally have the pathology report to show to the new breast surgeon since I am experiencing the same recurrent feeling I had prior to my first biopsy.  Praying everything still remains stable and if not praying it will be a cut and dry dx.  I don't like what ifs.  I will send you a pm once I get my thoughts together.

thanks again and I pray all stays well with you.

I read an article like this and it makes my blood boil.

http://www.breastcancer.org/symptoms/testing/new_research/20091021b.jsp

Oh you ladies- I love ya!

Younggrandma- call the Nurse navagitor and make her earn her keep starting with YOU! You don't have to wait until the 13th and she can give you tons of information. You are the reason she has a job so use her. This comes from a nurse and believe me we love to do our jobs- most of us have A VERY ANAL GENE , so let her go to work on your information. What me to call her? I will , there is just simply no reason to wait.

I called the lab that was preforming my pathology and told them I was "Dr so-in-so's nurse and Dr. (GOD) needed the results no later than Oct 7th" , so believe me I will call her if you want me to.

Fight for your answers- just like we girls have for everthing we get!

I think the waiting was the WORSE-  other than hearing that I had cancer- but then the wait, GOD save me I prayed like a crazy woman to have the patience not to do something CRAZY as I waited!