Andrea

Andrea
Diagnosed at 45, 10-year Survivor
Y-ME Hotline Director

"Feeling out of control is such a bad feeling. We help our callers find themselves again."

Andrea knew that breast cancer was common in her family. She made sure she got her mammogram and check-up every year. Then, ten years ago, she got the call to come back for more views. After that, the call from the doctor telling her she needed to see a surgeon.

The 45-year-old single mother of two teenagers had breast cancer, and the news kept getting worse. At first, it appeared that although the cancer was multifocal, she would only need a mastectomy. But Andrea was concerned about her family history, and just had a feeling that something was happening in her other breast as well. She opted for a prophylactic mastectomy of the other breast. She learned on the operating table that the insurance company had denied coverage for that procedure. The doctor assured her he would do the procedure for free if necessary, and the biopsy came back positive. Andrea had cancer in both breasts. The sentinel lymph node biopsy revealed that she had positive lymph nodes, which meant she needed extensive chemotherapy.

Andrea elected to have immediate reconstruction. She didn't know about Y-ME at the time, but a friend connected her to several other breast cancer patients who had undergone various types of reconstruction.

"Talking to other women really helped me make my decision." she says. "I didn't know these women, but they shared their experiences with me and it made a huge difference. I wondered at the time what happens to people who don’t have someone to talk to when they are in this situation."

Two years later, after hearing about Y-ME, Andrea was checking the Y-ME website to find out about volunteer opportunities and saw a job posting. She applied, was hired, and has been providing for other patients the kind of emotional support and information that she found so beneficial ever since.

"The most important thing we do, I think, is help women regain a sense of control over their lives. Being out of control is such a bad feeling, and breast cancer does that to you. They call and they say that nothing feels normal anymore and wonder if they will ever get back to their old selves. We can tell them that we felt just like that, that they aren't crazy and that they will get through this."

For Andrea, the hardest part of her experience was telling her son, then 18, and daughter, who was 15 at the time of her diagnosis.

"I was open and honest with them from the beginning." she says. "At first, they were scared and didn't want to talk about it, but I got them involved. My daughter became very interested in nutrition at that time, in making sure I got the right kinds of food and exercise. She is now a registered dietitian and I think my breast cancer was a major motivation for that decision.

"We have always handled everything with humor and we give each other a hard time. I'll say something and they'll roll their eyes, and say, 'right, mom, you're playing the cancer card again.' It's part of all of our lives."

Andrea recalls her own confusion over the complexity of all the information that was thrown at her during her initial diagnosis and treatment. She finds great satisfaction in helping patients understand and work through what is happening to them.

"I thought I was smart, but when the doctor hands you a pathology report, you really don't know what all those words mean or how they apply to you. We can walk our callers through the pathology reports step-by-step, and help them to know what questions they should ask their doctors. I really do believe that knowledge is power when you are facing breast cancer."