Timeline

I didn't start to write down anything until after I was diagnosed, but just for the history of the whole thing I will take you through these beginning steps from memory.

11/26/2005 - Found the lump
I went to the bathroom in the middle of the night and while I was doing my business I had a strong urge to feel my left breast. I never feel it or do a self exam because I have such lumpy breasts, but this time I did, and there was a small, hard (like a pencil eraser) lump over on the left side of my left breast close to my arm pit. I was okay - I didn't freak out, I went back to bed and even went to sleep, but first thing in the morning I called my GYN for an appointment.

I wasn't able to see him for a couple of days, and when I did he tried to reassure me it was a plugged duct. I wanted an ultrasound and asked him to arrange for one. I had had a mammogram within the year and nothing showed, so I wanted a more definitive view. I had been reading Suzanne Somer's book The Sexy Years and was pumped up about getting what I wanted from the doctors. TIP: don't buy into the doctor's 'all knowingness'. Yes, they do know more about medicine than you, but you know your body better than they do, so ask, no demand what you want.

12/2/05
I had the ultrasound. The lump was clear as a bell, nestled in there among all the veins and spidery looking globs that made up my breast tissue. I watched the process with a detachment I that still amazes me, after all this was only an ultra sound, not a diagnosis of cancer. But I knew. You know how you know something you have had no previous skill doing or no business knowing about, but you do? That's how I felt, but I was to have to wait for 10 days and a biopsy to officially confirm this knowing of mine.