Newly diagnosed at 26

Dear Carol,

Oh, Carol, so you have exactly the same dx! It is ironic but it is good to know someone with the same agressive grade, same stage and same family history (with no breast cancer).

Yulia, it seems the majority of us here with TNBC have grade 3 aggressive cancers.  Wasn't that the scariest thing in the world to hear for the first time?  It was for me.  Being around this big ole, smart, savy group of women that had the same thing I had is very calming and reassuring for me.  I hope it is for you as well. 

yes, I'm taking Calcium together with D3 but I don't know if I'm in lack of it...

Hello Yulia,

I was 66 a few years ago so I am slightly older than you as well...

I have been at MD Anderson hospital all this week for various tests. I am BRCA1+. I hope your results come back negative.

This is the story Komen published on their website. I am in their Advocates in Science Program.

http://ww5.komen.org/breastcancer/SteveK.html




I wanted you to read my story because sometimes the cancer can be hidden on the father's side. I do not have cancer, yet I passed the BRCA mutation on to my daughter. She was diagnosed with TNBC, at age 36.

I am not a medical professional but I am very committed to my volunteer advocacy work which has focused mainly on trying to help women with breast cancer and also several friends with melanoma and colorectal cancer.

Please do not be offended by my question but is there any chance you could go to London or the U.S. for your medical care; at least for a second opinion? I understand if there is no chance but if there is please send me a PM. I will give you some suggestions.

My grandmother was born in Odessa in 1899..who knows maybe somehow we are related?

good luck to you..whatever you decide..

all the best,

Steve

steve wrote: Hello Yulia, I was 66 a few years ago so I am slightly older than you as well... I have been at MD Anderson hospital all this week for various tests. I am BRCA1+. I hope your results come back negative. This is the story Komen published on their website. I am in their Advocates in Science Program. http://ww5.komen.org/breastcancer/SteveK.html I wanted you to read my story because sometimes the cancer can be hidden on the father's side. I do not have cancer, yet I passed the BRCA mutation on to my daughter. She was diagnosed with TNBC, at age 36. I am not a medical professional but I am very committed to my volunteer advocacy work which has focused mainly on trying to help women with breast cancer and also several friends with melanoma and colorectal cancer. Please do not be offended by my question but is there any chance you could go to London or the U.S. for your medical care; at least for a second opinion? I understand if there is no chance but if there is please send me a PM. I will give you some suggestions. My grandmother was born in Odessa in 1899..who knows maybe somehow we are related? good luck to you..whatever you decide.. all the best, Steve

Yulia wrote: yes, I'm taking Calcium together with D3 but I don't know if I'm in lack of it...

Yulia,  I like your picture!  The only way to tell your D3 level is through a blood test.  Maybe next time you visit with your onc, you can ask for the test.  Most of us with bc have very low levels.  Mine was 19 after chemo.  After taking 5,000 iu of D3 for several months, the levels are up to 47. 

Yulia,

You might ask your onc if you can have the D3 test while going through chemo.  My onc never discussed it and I had to ask her about it so it was a couple of months after finishing chem that she checked my blood.  I remember other women who've posted saying they were checked at diagnosis. 

Terje,

Have you seen any studies about BMI?

123Donna wrote: Terje,Have you seen any studies about BMI?

You're talking about Body Mass Index, right?

I haven't happened upon any studies talking about BMI and it's relationship to cancer, but I haven't specifically searched for any either. I have specifically searched for sugar, carbohydrate, and fat.

I do know that there are two types of diabetes. One is caused by your body not being able to make any insulin and the other is caused by your body not being able to produce enough.

For the type where your body can't produce enough, most of the time those inflicted are overweight. For those who are overweight, they can, "cure" their diabetes by losing weight.

This gives me the idea that an increase in body fat increases one's requirement for insulin, and therefor it makes sense that an increase in body fat would increase the aggressiveness of a tumor. However, this would be called a, "hypothesis" and to know if it's true or not one would have to do or find a study that shows that it's true. I'd be willing to guess that there are a few already out there that do exactly this.

That being said, what percentage of fat, sugar, or carbohydrates in your diet does not always mean that someone will be overweight. There are many people with very unhealthy diets who are not overweight and because they are slim and look healthy they are under the false impression that they are healthy and therefor they make no effort to eat healthy. Nonetheless, they do have less body fat and therefor a lower requirement for insulin and as a result may have lower insulin levels and maybe their cancers would turn out to be less aggressive (again another hypothesis/guess).

So it makes sense to me that there would be a correlation between BMI and cancer, but that doesn't in any way suggest that a high fat diet increases your risk of being diagnosed with cancer.

What else makes sense to me is that since high fat diets have been considered for a long time to be unhealthy, if you were to do a study to see if there's a correlation between fat intake and fitness, you'll probably find a higher percentage of people who eat less fat are fit. Does that mean that a low fat diet causes you to be more fit? Or does it mean that people who care more about being fit are more likely to have a low fat diet?

I saw all the articles about the nurses who took Aspirin having lower incidence of breast cancer. Does that mean that Aspirin lowers one's risk of breast cancer or does it mean that people who care about their health are at lower risk and that they're also more likely to take Aspirin daily? You can't tell from the information I saw. Maybe people who care more about their health are more likely to exercise, keep their BMI low, and take Aspirin. Who knows which one of those three things reduces their risk or even if it's one of those things at all?

The only way to know these things is through studies.