Thank you to everyone who commented on this thread. Very interesting and informative answers. I just wondered if it made sense that seemingly non-related symptoms and illnesses would crop up because of underlying malignancy.
Despite being a smoker and imbiber of wine, I was very healthy and fit and active. In July 2008 suddenly came down with raging tonsillitis and quinsey requiring hospitalisation, this happenend twice in quick succession followed by infections, fatigue and a fracture. My sick record at work had been v good up until then. I had all the jabs for all the seasonal viruses (I work in a hospital) but kept getting ill. I was on the point of being sacked for having too much time off sick when my diagnosis came through. 10cm of DCIS and four tumours, largest 30mm.
I am unsure as to whether my employer still wishes to pursue a disciplinary over my sick record before diagnosis (can just see the headlines, can you?) I would doubt it though the other day I received an email stating that if I wanted to receive my payslip in the post I would have to pay 2 pounds each time. I have a meeting with Occy Health soon looking at getting back to work and I will explore the issue pre-diagnosis citing some of the anecdotes on this thread.
I have no children and live alone and totally respect women who cope with a job plus family and especially this disease on top, don’t know how you do it. I guess when you have people depending on you you galvanise and push through, v tough though I imagine. Treatment finished now and it’s onwards and upwards, the worst is over, take care all x
This is an interesting thread. I was diagnosed in June this year but for the previous 6 months i had been unnaturally tired. I was working all day as normal but found it a effort to walk home which is only 5 minutes away & when i got home i’d want to doze off for an hour or so. I did think something wasn’t right but as everyone else says u just put it down to doing too much even though i wasn’t doing any more than usual. When i was diagnosed i did wonder if it might be connected.
I have often wondered about this too. I suspected I had a problem at least 6 months before I mentioned it to my GP. When my Oncologist asked me when I first was aware of a problem I hesitated (I wasn’t going to admit this delay to anyone, until I knew it hadnt spread. It was bad enough people feeling sorry for me for getting BC without them knowing how stupid I was putting off seeking advice). On hesitating, the Oncologist said I could possibly have had it ‘years’ (which made me feel a little better!) But the reason I did eventually mention it to my GP was because I had been going weekly for 2-3 months,feeling generally unwell, emotionally low and not coping at work and it was almost in the spirit of, well while I’m here, I might as well mention my left breast has turned solid. And the rest they say is history. I did wonder later whether my nonspecific malaise was an early ‘symptom’ of BC.
Whilst the whole experience of treatment was pretty horrible, I can at least look back on the 9 months I had off work as some respite from the work stress which I believe contributed to me becoming ill. Nearly 5 years on,I have taken early retirement and determined now to take every opportunity to get and stay well.
try not to beat yourself up over it… there will be many more women out there who feel tired, low, lethargic, run down who dont actually have cancer they are just feeling tired, low, lethargic or run down.
i think we are always looking for reasons and answers to our questions but realistically we will probably never know if we were feeling crap cos we were burning the candle at both ends, or not getting on with family or under pressure at work etc, or whether there was some underlying physiological factor at work making us feel that way.
the thing to look at is you have found it now and you can do something about it… i have had the lump on my chest for a number of months and being a BCN who had BC twice you would think id have known better, however i was reassured by previous mammos and USS… and although my MRI was delayed by 3 months (not my choice) it was found eventually and perhaps if i had the MRI in may when i was supposed to the area may have been too small to identify and it would actually be next may before it was found.