digitalgurl
14-04-17, 02:02
This is my first post although I've lurked here for over 3 years when my first really intense bout of HA came on. Back then it was IBC because of a simple scratch on my breast which then spiraled into colon cancer and a colonoscopy which in hindsight was good because they found precancerous polyps but no colon cancer.
My HA has always been with me since I was a kid. I grew up in the 80s when HIV/AIDS was all over the news. It terrified me. I remember hearing about a girl who got it from her dentist and at 10 years old I called my dentist to ask how they cleaned their tools, fearing I would contract this deadly scary disease too. I would manifest anxiety symptoms even then. Bad bowels. Stomach pains. Sweating. All at 10 years of age. When normal kids were playing, I was convinced I was dying. I was terrified of germs. I would wash my hands 100 times a day and walk around with my hands in the air so I wouldn't touch anything. My family lovingly called me "the surgeon".
Flash forward many years later, I struggled with regular anxiety- did I lock the door? Did i unplug the iron? The usual stuff. Then in my late 20s i suffered a serious car accident and subsequent concussion which I'm convinced made my OCD/anxiety 100x worse. I had a fall snowboarding on a trip and immediately thought of Natasha Richardson and how she fell and died a day later. I thought that was going to happen to me. Cue the worst panic attack of my life (to that point). It took 2 hours of walking around in cold mountain air to get it to break.
At that point I realized I needed help. I was the most scared I'd been in my life. I had been in therapy before but this time I needed meds. Celexa was my SSRI of choice and for 4 years it made me a zombie. Unable to feel ANYTHING - good or bad! I went off it abruptly (bad I know)
Fast forward to 2014 when I started lurking here. My HA spiraled for 4 months from Jan until May. Each year usually around Jan/Feb I get CRIPPLING HA. This year it started with a weird skin growth i thought was nodular melanoma. Nope. Dermatofibroma. Then I got sick with a horrible cold for a month. Thought about a friend who died from leukemia after recurrent infections. I had them on and off since December. Could I have leukemia?! Call the GP in a panic. Blood work done. Turns out just a high WBC. took a week of doxycycline (side note, this made my anxiety a million times worse - panic attacks constantly - use with caution)
My Cough lingered. Ran into a friend who said she had a cough that turned out to be lung cancer. HA goes through the moon. I immediately call my GP and ask for a CT scan. This whole time coughing, night sweats, tingly hands etc. Knowing what I suffer from, they oblige. I get the results back. Fatty liver and incidental finding of a 1.2cm axillary lymph node. Now because of alll my BC research in 2014 - I knew that could be a BC symptom. I begged her to give me a breast exam. She did. Nothing abnormal found. Agonized all weekend while waiting for a lymph node ultrasound. Results come back clear. Happiness is short lived though.
Tuesday night i decided to look at my breasts in the mirror and noticed a long vertical slight indentation to the side of my nipple that curves around the bottom of my breast. when I put my hands on my hips and flex (which I did not know to do until that day) I noticed a slight indent at the bottom of my breast. Wednesday hurried off to GP (not my normal girl, she was out sick) but the head of the practice. He examined me. Tried to explain the muscles that hold each breast up and that it appeared to be on both breasts but that the other side is bigger so it's less evident. He and his PA both gave me another breast exam and didn't find anything. He said a mammogram wasn't necessary.
I'm still not feeling confident as i can only see this dent and line on one breast. I made an appt at the breast clinic To see someone who specializes in breast health. I'm riddled with anxiety that I have a tumor growing in me that's spreading everywhere. Maybe that's why my vision has been a little blurry time to time? Maybe that's why I've got a slight back ache? Maybe they missed something 3 years ago at my mammogram (that I demanded) - how long has this dent been here? My mind is racing. Klonopin is the only thing getting me thru my nights. I have guttural fears of BC right now.
Anyone else have this happen with their breasts? Everything I see online points to indents as cancer. I have fibrocystic breasts so what if they missed something? Can a cancer grow that fast in 3 years that it'd be spreading everywhere?
I'm going out of my mind. Thanks for reading. Sorry for long post.
My HA has always been with me since I was a kid. I grew up in the 80s when HIV/AIDS was all over the news. It terrified me. I remember hearing about a girl who got it from her dentist and at 10 years old I called my dentist to ask how they cleaned their tools, fearing I would contract this deadly scary disease too. I would manifest anxiety symptoms even then. Bad bowels. Stomach pains. Sweating. All at 10 years of age. When normal kids were playing, I was convinced I was dying. I was terrified of germs. I would wash my hands 100 times a day and walk around with my hands in the air so I wouldn't touch anything. My family lovingly called me "the surgeon".
Flash forward many years later, I struggled with regular anxiety- did I lock the door? Did i unplug the iron? The usual stuff. Then in my late 20s i suffered a serious car accident and subsequent concussion which I'm convinced made my OCD/anxiety 100x worse. I had a fall snowboarding on a trip and immediately thought of Natasha Richardson and how she fell and died a day later. I thought that was going to happen to me. Cue the worst panic attack of my life (to that point). It took 2 hours of walking around in cold mountain air to get it to break.
At that point I realized I needed help. I was the most scared I'd been in my life. I had been in therapy before but this time I needed meds. Celexa was my SSRI of choice and for 4 years it made me a zombie. Unable to feel ANYTHING - good or bad! I went off it abruptly (bad I know)
Fast forward to 2014 when I started lurking here. My HA spiraled for 4 months from Jan until May. Each year usually around Jan/Feb I get CRIPPLING HA. This year it started with a weird skin growth i thought was nodular melanoma. Nope. Dermatofibroma. Then I got sick with a horrible cold for a month. Thought about a friend who died from leukemia after recurrent infections. I had them on and off since December. Could I have leukemia?! Call the GP in a panic. Blood work done. Turns out just a high WBC. took a week of doxycycline (side note, this made my anxiety a million times worse - panic attacks constantly - use with caution)
My Cough lingered. Ran into a friend who said she had a cough that turned out to be lung cancer. HA goes through the moon. I immediately call my GP and ask for a CT scan. This whole time coughing, night sweats, tingly hands etc. Knowing what I suffer from, they oblige. I get the results back. Fatty liver and incidental finding of a 1.2cm axillary lymph node. Now because of alll my BC research in 2014 - I knew that could be a BC symptom. I begged her to give me a breast exam. She did. Nothing abnormal found. Agonized all weekend while waiting for a lymph node ultrasound. Results come back clear. Happiness is short lived though.
Tuesday night i decided to look at my breasts in the mirror and noticed a long vertical slight indentation to the side of my nipple that curves around the bottom of my breast. when I put my hands on my hips and flex (which I did not know to do until that day) I noticed a slight indent at the bottom of my breast. Wednesday hurried off to GP (not my normal girl, she was out sick) but the head of the practice. He examined me. Tried to explain the muscles that hold each breast up and that it appeared to be on both breasts but that the other side is bigger so it's less evident. He and his PA both gave me another breast exam and didn't find anything. He said a mammogram wasn't necessary.
I'm still not feeling confident as i can only see this dent and line on one breast. I made an appt at the breast clinic To see someone who specializes in breast health. I'm riddled with anxiety that I have a tumor growing in me that's spreading everywhere. Maybe that's why my vision has been a little blurry time to time? Maybe that's why I've got a slight back ache? Maybe they missed something 3 years ago at my mammogram (that I demanded) - how long has this dent been here? My mind is racing. Klonopin is the only thing getting me thru my nights. I have guttural fears of BC right now.
Anyone else have this happen with their breasts? Everything I see online points to indents as cancer. I have fibrocystic breasts so what if they missed something? Can a cancer grow that fast in 3 years that it'd be spreading everywhere?
I'm going out of my mind. Thanks for reading. Sorry for long post.