Simply search #brca on Instagram and you will find over 37,000 images connected to beautiful, brave, strong women in various stages of their BRCA+ journey. It is significantly more common now to find women, as young as age 23, brave their BRCA world head-on with preventative mastectomies and oophorectomies.
My story is just 1 out of thousands of women who have also been diagnosed with BRCA mutations. My story starts at the pre-adolescent age of 10 when my mother was first diagnosed with breast cancer in 1990, when little was known on how to effectively treat triple negative breast cancers. The now common A/C and Taxol chemotherapy regiments were relatively brand new and exploratory back then. The medical community knew nothing of BRCA genetic mutations and its connection to breast and ovarian cancers.
Perhaps others can find comfort, solace, and further understanding of what it means to identify as BRCA through my story. I share with all my sister BRCA fighters and encourage you to engage, learn, ask, and seek support. We are all in this together.
I start my blog with a Facebook post I made the night I received my remission news about a week after my mastectomy surgery. I, like my mom, am a breast cancer survivor. Mastectomy is just one small piece of my BRCA story, but quite an important piece to share.
February 3rd, 2017
Facebook Family & Friends – In light of all the heavy political news, I’d like to take a moment to announce some very positive news!
At the end of January, my family & I embarked upon the second phase of my breast cancer journey; one that we hoped would be the very last, necessary step to conquer and prevent the disease from ever recurring again. I am ecstatic to report, that I’m now 100% in remission!!
While this last phase physically changed me, it will never define who I am as a woman. I will always be a mother, daughter, wife, sister, aunt, niece. I bare scars of a survivor and damn proud of it!
Thank you again to my wonderful circle of support. I am very lucky and extremely thankful!!
“Remember that bravery is not a lack of fear, but the ability to move forward in spite of fear”…
Much more to come my BRCA sisters… stay tuned!
Good company in a journey makes the way seem shorter. — Izaak Walton
Breaking BRCA+ 