Reactive Lymph Node. Breast acting weird. Worried.

Hey there!

I hope everyone is doing as good as possible and I wish you all good health because everyone deserves it.

This is a bit detailed, but I needed to get it off my chest. Sorry for any mistakes, I'm not a native speaker of English.

I'm a 23 year old woman and I know it's statistically rare for me to get breast cancer, I'm still worried. As far as I know, my family history extends to: dad died of lung cancer last year, one great grandmother of ovarian cancer, one great grandfather of stomach cancer. There's probably other cancers in my history that I don't know about.

In January I observed that my left armpit was swollen. It didn't have a definite lump on it as Google Images showed me how a swollen lymph node should look, but it felt and looked swollen or fatter than my right armpit. I had discomfort and pain in my left armpit and breast for two weeks (granted, it could have been hormonal because since February my periods are messed up). I still have discomfort, but pain comes and goes every couple of days. It was either a pain like when you pull a muscle or a burning sensation. I also observed my left breast felt a little fuller, a little bigger and my areola skin looked all wrinkly. More on my left breast than my right breast.

I've never been to a doctor to physically examine my breasts, but I decided to get a ultrasound in February. My appointment wasn't quite what I expected. The ultrasound was alright albeit a bit rough. At one point, in my left breast, my doctor went over some sort of lump but he didn't say anything so I assumed it was breast tissue. That lump was painful and when he went over it, it felt like when you go over a bump in the road. He focused on it but said nothing.

The doctor told me both of my armpit lymph nodes are reactive but other than that I look perfectly healthy.

On my (quite short and a bit uninformative) report it says that 1) I have reactive lymph nodes in both of my armpits 2) my BIRADS is 1 3) "No suspicious lesions for mammary neoplasia detected" (may sound weird as I translated) and 4) Yearly ultrasounds recommended. He gave me a gel with ibuprofen for the pain and sent me off.

I looked up reactive lymph nodes and found out that they're caused by infection, chronic illness such as HIV or cancer (breast, lung or lymphoma), but if it's a common infection, the swelling of lymph nodes should go down in a month. I was shocked that the doctor sent me off, despite my reactive lymph nodes.

I did have a long time infection, but it is obviously unrelated. A tooth on the /right/ side of my mouth was infected. I even got antibiotic treatment for it in February and it had no effect on the swollen lymph node. This was after I went to the ultrasound otherwise I would have mentioned this to the doctor.

Anyhow.. it's 24 March and my left armpit lymph node is still swollen and causing me some trouble. Breast pain comes and goes every few days, but I mostly have discomfort in my whole arm which sometimes aches or pulsates or tingles. Sometimes I feel like my left arm is weakened in compared to my right arm.

I also have (but I have had them for a long time so I didn't make any connections at first) two visible veins on the side of my left breast.

I'm planning to do the ultrasound again at another clinic. I'm always stressing about this because I suffer from Anxiety which has focused on Health Anxiety lately. I know I have some mental health issues with anxiety, but my symptoms are real.

If any of you have anything to say that can help, that would be awesome.