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The
Mastectomy Story
I have
spent
every possible moment for the past three months with a friend who was
diagnosed
with breast cancer this past September. As
we sat having coffee after her initial visit to
the doctor, she could
see that I was having a tough time trying not to break out in tears. Finally,
she said, “Listen, honey,
there’s
something you don’t know and I think it’s about
time I
shared it with you.”
“In
Small-town,
USA, sixty some odd years ago, I was one year old when my mother
noticed a mole
on the nipple of my right breast. Over
the next month the mole grew rapidly and turned an ugly bluish black
color.
Because of the
lack of knowledge
and modern technology, this led to a complete and radical mastectomy of
my
right breast.
My mother was
told that if
they didn’t remove all of the mammary glands, it would
probably
become
cancerous and spread rapidly.”
“Unfortunately,
my mother was never the kind of person to discuss anything intimate,
but thanks
to my older sisters, when I reached my teenage years, there were these
foam
pads girls used to pad their swimsuit cups. These
worked fine for many years and could be cut to
any size needed.”
“In
my mid
thirties I moved to a large city. The
pads were impossible to find as women were starting to loosen the
cocoon style
of dressing.
They were
dropping the
girdles, corsets and padding.
I talked
with my gynecologist and he recommended that I try to find a medical
supply
store.
They should carry
the new fangled
prosthesis that had recently appeared on the market.
I
went home and scoured the yellow
pages.
I found two
medical supply stores
and got lucky when I found a small boutique that specialized in
mastectomy
bras.”
“The
experience of having a clerk fondle me to make sure we had the proper
size and
to show me the proper way to put them on was the most unnerving and
humiliating
feeling I have ever experienced. I
never
intended to go through that again. Needless
to say, when I was faced with leaving
that city, I purchased a large supply of bras before I left.”
“Now
for the
past fifteen to eighteen years, I have been able to find bras,
prostheses and
swimsuits through catalogs.
Unfortunately,
the catalogs I have been purchasing
from have decided
that they will no longer carry them. Now,
if the doctor says I have to have another
mastectomy, I am going to
have to find another place to buy these products. The prospect of this
scares
me a lot more than the diagnosis. Oh,
well, maybe I’ll just run around flat chested.”
Then, she
looked at me with a damp twinkle in her eyes and said, “Look,
honey, if they do
have to perform a mastectomy and it’s the worst that happens
to
me for the next
sixty years, I’ll consider myself extremely lucky.”
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