EP17 - Faith, Resilience, and Life After Breast Cancer  ## Metadata - Author: [[The MenoPosse Show]] - Full Title: EP17 - Faith, Resilience, and Life After Breast Cancer - Category: #podcasts - URL: https://share.snipd.com/episode/355070e9-667b-4b6b-8e64-f15be9ac9599 ## Document Notes ## Highlights - **Mammogram To Diagnosis Timeline** - Lolly found a suspicious area on a mammogram after years of dense, fibrocystic breasts and regular 3D imaging. - A biopsy on Leap Day confirmed breast cancer and set a rapid treatment timeline including lumpectomy on her birthday. Transcript: Lolly Ashburn Going to say, Lolly, if we could just start from the beginning, when were you first diagnosed? It was Valentine's Day that I had my mammogram in 2024. I failed that. But I had been on a mammogram schedule and I'd also had been having 3D mammograms. So I know that I have fibrocystic dense breasts that are hard to read. And several times my left breast would get called back when I was just doing your regular mammogram and they need to take a closer look. Then I started requesting 3D mammograms and I would get called back less but this particular time they were focused on the right side and what was interesting about it is I remembered The previous mammogram the year before they had been looking and looking the techs were and and we already talked about how I exercise and at that time I also had been doing weights and This kind of thing. And they kept looking and said, what are you guys looking at? Can I see what you're looking at? And they said the standard, oh yeah, your breasts are just really hard to read. So we're just taking a look. And the nurse and me wanted to see. So they showed me and I said, what's this right here? And I pointed up and they said, oh, that's your pectoral muscle. You must work out. So I was like, oh, yes, I have been doing weights. I didn't really ask any more questions. In retrospect, I wish I would have said there's something hard to read. Do we need to examine it further? But I didn't. And so flash forward the next year, the cancer had more time to grow and more time to be shown. So it was peeking out. What happens with the cancer is a lot of times it's in your body for eight to 10 years before it's even large enough to be detected, which is how they really promote the self-examination And all of the things you can do to be on top of it. And so once they told me that I needed to go for the ultrasound and it was on the right side, it's something told me in my gut, this isn't going to be good, but everything was fast moving. So it was February. I had the ultrasound done like the week after Valentine's Day. And then the next week they said, come back in for a biopsy. My goodness. So the results of the biopsy came on leap day. So it was a leap year that they said that it was in fact breast cancer and that they didn't think there was lymph node involvement, but I was going to need to have surgery and blah, blah, Blah. So that started the ball rolling. And then in April is when I had the lumpectomy done and it was on my birthday. ([Time 0:14:18](https://share.snipd.com/snip/9103e82c-4b91-4e6a-9514-ec34760f57a3)) - **Lymph Node Findings Changed The Plan** - During lumpectomy they injected dye and removed nine lymph nodes; one showed micrometastasis while eight were clear. - That micrometastasis increased her treatment requirements and follow-up monitoring. Transcript: Lolly Ashburn Lolly, did they do an ultrasound of both breasts or just the right breast? They did an ultrasound of the right breast, but they did what's called a bilateral MRI. Oh, okay. They did do that for both just to be sure there was nothing going on in the left. That's what kind of told them that they didn't at the time, they didn't think there was lymph node involvement. But what they do when I learned it when they do the lumpectomy is they shoot a die in and that die would travel the path that your cancer would if it was going to spread and it would go to the Lymph nodes and nine of mine lit up and so they removed nine lymph nodes but when they tested them only one of them showed micrometastasis which is a small amount of movement. The other eight were clear. So because of the micrometastasis and the fact that they don't know if it could have traveled anywhere, that's why I have extra hoops to jump through. ([Time 0:17:39](https://share.snipd.com/snip/803016c6-68d5-43b8-94a1-539c8cc3780b)) - **Menopause Changes Drug Choices** - Menopausal status directly affects which hormone‑blocking medicines are appropriate. - Postmenopausal women receive aromatase inhibitors like letrozole instead of tamoxifen. Transcript: Lolly Ashburn Yes. Every time you go to the doctor, they ask you all the questions. When was your last cycle or blah, blah. Is there any history of such and such in your family? All the questions. So they have a little bit of a blueprint of you. But me being a nurse, maybe they talk to me a little bit differently than they would somebody like a lay person, if you will, because I did come in with my whole list of questions and wanted To be very involved in my care because I'm always telling my patients, you got to advocate for yourself. So I had to take my own advice. But yeah, your medicine can change. One medicine that a lot of people talk about is tamoxifen. Tamoxifen would be a hormone blocker for somebody who had not entered menopause. So tamoxifen wouldn't have been a choice for me. Now, so anestrizole or letrozole, those are ones that are for post-menopausal. So those could be a choice for me. We went with letrozole in my case, but the kind of thing is the doctors will ask you what side effects are you having? ([Time 0:26:53](https://share.snipd.com/snip/f36577b0-0f3f-4be8-9d7a-8c820e1d04c0)) - **Move, Hydrate, And Consider Fasting** - Maintain regular movement and light exercise to combat chemotherapy fatigue and aid recovery. - Hydrate well and consider short fasting windows before/after chemo only after consulting your medical team. Transcript: Lolly Ashburn And so I did a lot of things to help with that. Now, when I was going through chemotherapy, one thing I did was I fasted and I would do it like 12 hours before I was going to get a dose. And I would try to do it like 12 to 20 hours after the chemotherapy started. I was reading that what happens is the chemo goes to the cancer, but it doesn't go to the cells that are lying dormant because you've been fasting. So then you have less of some of those side effects. Now, again, it would be different for everybody and you have to talk to your medical team, but yeah, I was not. Do you feel like that helped you doing the fasting? I do. I almost felt like I wish that I could have fasted longer, but you get hungry. And so you got to eat. But yeah, I feel like my side effects were maybe lessened some. And I also was able to continue some of the activities that I normally would do, like the walking we talked about and some of those things. I too would do stretches and the yoga and some of that kind of stuff, but I think it did help. I would do it again. ([Time 0:28:18](https://share.snipd.com/snip/c72efa9c-a638-42e8-bdcc-b5652c3aaee6)) - **Practical Symptom Remedies To Keep Nearby** - Keep symptom‑management meds and practical tips on hand (examples: Claritin for bone pain, Tums for watery eyes). - Prehydrate and drink water aggressively to help flush chemo and reduce side effects. Transcript: Lolly Ashburn They would say, say, for example, there was different medicines that helped. So like Claritin is a medicine that you typically would take maybe for seasonal allergies or something like that. But they would, for whatever reason with my chemo concoction that they were giving to me they recommended that I have claritin on hand in case I had any bone pain and I only had bone pain Twice but both times that I had bone pain I took the claritin and the bone pain went away oh but isn't it yeah and then another one was my eyes would water a lot And so they recommended Tums For your eyes watering, which if they would have not told me, I would have not tried that. But yep, it works. So really have something to do with the way there's poison in my body that's trying to do some other things. And the other medicine went after what it was supposed to do. Of course, drinking a lot of water helped because even through the chemo, I would prehydrate and I would drink a lot because they need it to be in your body. But the faster you flush it out, the less side effects you're going to have from it. I was always drinking water. ([Time 0:29:56](https://share.snipd.com/snip/55032b92-62ee-432a-a166-eb86b3ea5fce)) - **Switching Teams Changed Treatment** - After initial doctors proposed a harsh chemo ( Transcript: Lolly Ashburn And initially they, they wanted to put me on a chemotherapy that's nicknamed red devil. And I'm very spiritual. Like I've like 25 years at the same church, whatever. I was like, I just don't feel like God wants me to have red devil. Really? I was like talking to him, Lord, really? You want me to have red devil? If I have to, I'll let's find another option. But I was out walking one day. And what I sometimes do when I don't have anybody to walk with is I call friends from back in California and I catch up with them. And I had a teacher that I had taught with, and she was always more like a mother figure because she was older than me and had taught a lot of friends of mine. And so she mentored me in that sense. And we just always stayed close. And so I was catching her up and letting her know what I was going through and how I had been seeing cancer doctors and they wanted to do surgery and they were getting ready to put a port in Because I got my port on April Fool's Day. You know, I told you everything was a holiday. So easy. So this was just before April Fool's Day. And I was telling her I'm going to get a port and they're going to do all this. She, too, had some cancer experience in her family and she had a sister who actually worked at john hopkins and so she said do you mind if i talk to my sister about what's going on with you Because i don't like the sounds of it either and i was like oh yeah talk to anybody you want to anyway her sister called me immediately and was like no you do not put the port in but you do not Let them give you red devil she's like how far away are you from emory and not to plug whatever but i was like oh it's probably like 45 minutes about like driving from chula vista to la jolla Which is two cities in california that i knew great i need you to get to emory as soon as possible i'm gonna call blah blah they'll get in touch with you and you know how hard it is to get appointments I just I was pushing memory. Yeah. No, she said that I got a call the next day. They were like, can you come tomorrow? Blah, blah, blah. I was right in there quick. And the doctor came in and she said to me, now, how funny is it that, you know, somebody who was friends with my mentor in John Hopkins. And I'm like, how funny is that? But yeah, she got me with my doctor and that. And it gave me a little bit more confidence because she said, no, we're going to do some things and make sure we're on the right regimen. We have been over medicating cancer in this country for a lot of years that we can do. ([Time 0:35:23](https://share.snipd.com/snip/30ced9d3-4c47-41ee-aa2d-60c156bef9fc)) - **Request Tumor Genomic Testing** - Ask for an Oncotype (or genomic) test to tailor chemotherapy recommendations to your tumor. - Use the score to avoid over‑treatment when chemo offers limited benefit. Transcript: Lolly Ashburn And her journey is a little different than mine, but it was enough. We had enough similarities that she would say to me, here in Birmingham, they're having me do X, Y, Z, ask about this. And so I would go in saying, I've heard about an oncotype score. Can I have an oncotype test? When will I be getting that? Blah, blah, blah. Am I a candidate? And so that I tell everybody get an oncotype for your tumor because what they do is they'll take a portion of the tumor out when you know they're doing your surgery and they'll test it and It indicates more what your chemo need would be so if you think about it like when we were kids in school and we got a test we went 100 was good whatever yeah this goes the opposite way so if You get zero to 25 say then it means really you're not necessarily a candidate for chemo because it's going to do more harm than good in your case yeah you're 26 to 50 then you know you're Probably going to need a little bit of chemo but you're not going to need some mac daddy red devil yeah but if you're like 51 to 100 you're going to probably get the full-blown whatever So I was hoping to be on the low end like my son's future mother-in but but no I was right in the middle like my son was 25 and I was like but 25 it says 25 and she was like no because they also looked At around the ki 67 another portion of your they do all the blood tests and you get all these scores and that was a little high which meant my tumor was fast moving yeah so why is the onco score Not standard why is that not standard probably because doesn't want to pay for it. Or certain doctors, like the doctor that I went to initially, he was more a component for a test called a mammoprint, which does give you other information too. Sometimes they have their protocol and their way of doing things. And so I did ask about it when I was with the first team and, oh, it's not time for that. ([Time 0:38:11](https://share.snipd.com/snip/b90a87c5-8063-4af7-b3e6-7e3c9e95e720)) - **Let Community Help And Advocate Hard** - Invite community help and accept concrete support like meals, rides, and company for walks. - Actively advocate for yourself and ask questions during visits to shape a personalized care plan. Transcript: Keri But the other thing I hear you saying is that you're not doing this alone. Like one, you're letting community in to serve you in very tangible ways, like providing meals, but you're also asking questions and asking opinions and work in your network, if you Will. Yeah. It's led to you maybe finding care that you're more confident in or having questions to ask. So I think that's a, for anybody that's listening, a great example, because I imagine it's not, it's, you're sharing incredibly vulnerable things. And I can imagine that's not super comfortable for a lot of people, but it sounds like that has played a role, a significant role in you finding the treatment that you need. Lolly Ashburn I think so. I feel like there's timing and you just never know who you share something with. Like when I just was randomly venting to the teacher I used to work with, That would end up changing my whole journey. And I'm like, so thankful that happened. I was prayerfully going into everything going, please just open the right doors, close the wrong doors, because so many things can happen. And you've heard medical horror stories when you're thinking about somebody chopping up your girls. Yeah, yeah. But I love too that my breast surgeon, when they were talking about it, they were like, yeah, and we're going to go ahead and remove some from the left side so you'll be balanced and we'll Just lift them both. ([Time 0:46:08](https://share.snipd.com/snip/ef63fa85-baaa-47f6-8c1a-341750c298c6)) - **Walking Group Kept Her Going** - Lolly emphasizes consistency: keep moving and take small steps to regain strength and function. - Neighborhood walking groups helped her maintain exercise and accountability through treatment. Transcript: Lolly Ashburn Do really feel strongly that people need to keep on moving because if you don't use it you lose it and all the things eating healthy is great but moving is key and we need to get off the couch And away from all of the things that, you know, and let's just try to take small steps. Small steps, you'll get there in the end. Danielle Yeah. I will tell you how the ladies in my neighborhood also and Lolly was a part of this got me to walk was they told me I only had to go halfway and I could turn around and go back and I was like oh Okay well three mile loop I think you guys snickered on that clever clever of course I wasn't thinking that I was like oh okay if I just don't want to do the whole thing I could just turn around You can go halfway up stone mountain too there you go hey at least the second half is downhill oh ([Time 0:53:59](https://share.snipd.com/snip/10c3c968-3fc9-4aa8-94be-3e3bced3547b))