second primary breast cancer
 

hi everyone-

i have a question - has anyone here current or past ever had a second primary breast cancer diagnosis? i know i am jumping WAY ahead by even thinking about it, but my oncologist yesterday kept saying "if it is cancer" and since i only finished treatment in october, naturally my thoughts revolve around 'what if?"

what happened is i went in for an MRI on tuesday feeling completely at ease and positive. i had a clear mammogram 5 months ago, this is just a routine screening. my onco called me that night saying the radiologist says all looks well with my original cancer breast, but saw several spots in my originally clean breast. he said "they might be a whole buncha nothing" but they showed some odd characteristics, so he ordered an ultrasound. the tech was doing the US when a doctor came in and took over. it seems i have 5 spots in my right breast ranging from a few mm's in size to 1 cm. he said "they're probably fibroadenomas, but we've never seen them look like this on an MRI". not real reassuring and rather confusing. it seems they have more enhancement than they should (all of them) (i.e. a glow around them) that is usually a sign of carcinoma. but then he's rattling off 98% chance they're FA's, but we need to biopsy the biggest one.

i read on the net that FA's aren't terribly common in women over 50 and it seems they don't usually come in gangs of 5 either. i ordered the MRI report sent to me and saw my onco yesterday. the 1 cm is not palpable. scheduling a wire biopsy of it for next week. i find her so hard to read, and i know she was trying to cover all bases and knew where my mind would go - cancer. she said if it is, it would be considered a new primary breast cancer.

the odds are so stacked against it being cancer at all, i should be calm and cool, but i'm struggling with that. i never thought i'd be biopsied again, nevermind 5 months after i finished herceptin. and i know MRI's run the risk of showing false positives. intellectually i think "yeah, i have dense breasts and they are fibroadenomas". emotionally i think about what were the chances of me getting cancer after losing bob to it, and what were the chances of mom dying of it right after i finished rads? i don't think much of odds anymore.

anyway, i am rattling on. nobody understands like others who've had or have cancer. my friends say "focus on the 98%!" and i do try, honest, but they have no idea what it feels like to have ever had cancer in the first place. i just needed a place to vent to those who know the fear and anxiety. 98% is a good number and i really do need to focus on it because the 2% can drive you up a wall.

thank you for listening.

valerie

Re: second primary breast cancer
 

Valerie,

It's good to hear from you. You probably already have the information: http://breastcancer.about.com/od/mam...roadenomas.htm

Looks like it can be easily discerned by an ultrasound. But a biopsy can get a definitive answer and help get rid of the big one before it causes any discomfort.

Not fun to have to endure another procedure. I am sending you good vibes.

Re: second primary breast cancer
 

thanks, jackie. my sense from the doctor who did the ultrasound was that he could not definitively declare it them fibroadenomas any more than the radiologist could who did the MRI. what i wish is that they'd done a baseline MRI before i ever even had the original tumor taken out so we'd know if these were even there back then. i had to fight to get them to even mammo the right breast. i will be happy when the surgeon gets the little bugger out and declares it harmless. v

Re: second primary breast cancer
 

Hi Valerie,

Are you postmenopausal? Have you had hormone treatment? I find that after finishing my 5 years of Arimidex and Zoladex, my breasts are changing.

First my periods came back after almost 6 years of blessed relief. Then I developed a strange lump on my right (non BC) nipple. Nobody knows what it is, but there are no indications that it could be cancer. It grew there in three months and then stopped growing. Weird. Am having it checked regularly and check for alarming symptoms, like itch, discharge, retracted nipple, scabs, but none of those have happened.

I had another mammo a month ago because I felt a small lump. They did an ultrasound and declared it a cyst. There were lots of other small cysts that weren't palpable. Now the breast is a bit painfull when touched. It seems the hormonal upheaval caused by menopause is doing all kinds of things I don't like. As long as there's no cancer, though, I'm taking it one step at the time.

My periods took a break for two months, only to return a few weeks ago. During my holiday ofcourse. Grr!

I hope the biopsy will give you peace of mind. I was very, very scared when those first pesky symptoms showed up, but have learned to go with the flow. I freak out less and less. But I do monitor my breasts - and all the rest of me - for weird symptoms. Can't help myself doing that. Once one has had a cancer diagnosis, that's never far from one's mind, is it?

Love

Jacqueline

Re: second primary breast cancer
 

The main problem with MRI is that it finds a whole bunch of things. I want to get one but my radiation onc warns that "I could open Pandora's box" for nothing. Like you, I had no previous baseline and I have had cancer on the right and 2 surgical biopsies on the left so I am sure both breasts would show nothing but a big ole mess on MRI.

Like you are going through now, anything that can't easily be explained has to be investigated (opening Pandora's box) because it would be remiss just in case it is something.

Also, even though common things like cysts and FA's seem to be for younger women, this perimenopausal time is when the hormones are a really mess and cause alot of havoc in our bodies. Naturally the breasts are a place for the action of hormones can be evident.

False positives can only be ruled out via biopsy. Keep the faith and I will be thinking about you!

Re: second primary breast cancer
 

Like Becky said, Pandora's Box can be a troublesome thing indeed. I hate bore everyone with my story again, but it is a cautionary tale. Basically, I had a chronic cough and I lighted up some lung scans. The next thing, I was having a surgical biopsy which was positive for lung cancer so they removed a lobe of my lung. A few days later, I was told it was all a big mistake and the biopsy was wrong! It was just an old pneumonia.
My point is, scans can "over read" things but once they do, it has to be followed up. And then people can get overly vigilant because they dont want to miss anything.
I think this is part of the argument why routine scans can be as much of a problem as they can be of help.
The other part of my message is to keep the faith because even when things look grim they are not always what they seem, at all.

Re: second primary breast cancer
 

thanks so much to everyone who replied. i've probably been more anxious than i should have been because i only just finished treatment a couple months ago and this hit me out of left field. the radiologist and my oncologist were a little spooky too, but my surgeon was very confident these spots are fibroadenomas and i feel more relieved after seeing him. he doesn't want to do a wire guided biopsy because i already went through so much surgery last year (4) so i'm getting either a fine needle or core biopsy. i forgot to ask which. at first they couldn't schedule me til march 31 which is the day AFTER i come home from aruba, my first vacation since mom died! luckily my surgeon's really cool and when i emailed him that i'd been crying in his parking lot, he got on it himself. now i have an appointment tuesday march 15. that way i get the results before i leave on the 23rd. if they are are good results, that much more reason to rejoice on the beach. if not good, well what better place to contemplate what would be coming up in my future.

i know you're all right, it's a cluster of fibroadenomas. i didn't think i even had any hormones left, what with tamoxifen and a total hysterectomy. why do my boobs have to act up and unnerve me. but thank you for the reassurance, i sure do feel a whole lot better. i knew the dangers of MRI's and false positives, but i'd rather be safe than sorry any old day. i'll report back with the findings! i appreciate your help. valerie