Maria's Story from New York

I am a 46 year old married woman and the mother of three children, ages 15, 17 and 21 from Long Island, New York. I went for my mammography every year. The last week in May of this year, on my routine mammography, they found a suspicious mass, which was then confirmed with a sonogram and then later biopsied.

After going to a few breast surgeon opinions and then having an MRI of both breasts, it was confirmed that I had definitely breast cancer. It was identified as "poorly differentiated infiltrating mammary duct carcinoma". I had a 2.5 cm tumor in the right breast along with 9 affected lymph nodes and a very small tumor in the left breast, which was the very beginning of cancer.

At that point, I had a double mastectomy and lymph node dissection on the right side of the removal of 21 lymph nodes and a sentinel node check on the left side. I found the surgery to be very devastating and painful. I had surgical drains for 2 1/2 weeks. I had temporary saline extenders put in, which are going to be replaced with permanent saline implants in January.

After surgery and before chemotherapy, I had a medi-port inserted surgically for the treatments. I have undergone and completed the first phase of chemo for eight weeks (which were a total of four treatments) which were drugs called adriamycin and cytoxin and I am now undergoing the second part of the chemotherapy, which is a drug called Taxol for twelve weeks, along with a hormone called Herceptin, which needs to be administered for 52 weeks.

The Hormone is needed due to the fact that the tumor was HER 2 positive. After chemotherapy ends, I will undergo 5 1/2 weeks of radiation. My feelings went around in circles of fear, shock, anger, anxiety and depression-in a circle over and over again. It is so hard to lose your breasts and become disfigured and then to lose your hair. At first, I felt like I was completely robbed of my life and then I tried to move on and be strong and fight this as hard as I can.

At this point, I am still on the beginning of the second phase of the chemo. I am trying to be strong and think positive and fight this as hard as I can. I have been very fortunate to have a husband, family and many friends that are very supportive and at my side all the time, and I believe that this is helping me to get through this ordeal in my life at this time.

I'm hoping to get through time and look back at all of this as just a memory in my life. I hope that this makes me a stronger person and a better person. I'm taking my life one day at a time and trying to not sweat the small stuff in life and not to worry about things that are not important. I also hope to help another person get through this when I am completely healed and well.

Floral Park, New York