Do your boobs define you?

Dina & Maggie continue their series of conversations about FEAR, and in today’s episode, they are discussing some of the fearful decisions surrounding the surgical options most of us face. Both Dina & Maggie get vulnerable with their own experience and choices around the surgeries they underwent and just how important it is to advocate for yourself. There are many fears and emotions that surround these decisions but KNOW that the decision is YOURS!

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Dina Legland is a Certified Life and Wellness Coach who uses her personal and professional experience to support clients in remission to conquer fears to achieve a life filled with joy, freedom, and inner peace. As the founder of Wellness Warriors for Life, LLC, Registered Nurse & EMT for over 30 years, Dina spent her life caring for others.

As The Inner Warrior Coach and Cancer Survivor Dina says, “Cancer Saved My Life and My Fears Almost Killed Me!”

Her Mission is to share her experiences, wisdom, tools, strategies, and humor to conquer uncontrollable fears and to seek inner wellness with freedom guilt-free.

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Maggie Judge is an energetic, passionate explorer of healing; mind, body and spirit. Her career was focused on helping teams innovate and navigate business problems with tools and support. A Breast Cancer diagnosis empowered her to tap into that previous experience and create tools that she needed to help her navigate her unpredictable, challenging journey. She founded LoveME Healing as a way to share her tools with others. Maggie says "My cancer diagnosis was devastating, but the healing journey has been transformational."

Her mission is to help others in breast cancer by sharing her experience, insights, tools and community to heal.

https://www.lovemehealing.org/

https://www.instagram.com/loveme_healing/

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Do our boobs define us? In this episode, we will share some of the fearful decisions surrounding a surgical plan that most of us face. The decision is yours, but so much goes into it. Welcome back to another episode. Today, we're going to get deep into speaking about breast cancer diagnosis. And the choices that we make when it comes to surgery. And this isn't something that we all face, some people will some people will not, it all depends on the treatment plan and the surgical plan,

I will jump in here with a trigger warning because we're gonna get raw here. And for those of you that are believing this may bring up some emotions that you're not ready for at this point, my friend, just take care of you and come back another time. Just wanted to make that clear ahead of time. But yeah, go ahead. And you know,

what I'd like to discuss today is all about the fear that we may face when we make the decision of having surgery. So maybe, what was your perspective? What was your decision? What were you faced? Did you hear the word surgery?

I did. And it's interesting, because this, this was there was a lot of different fears wrapped in this one, as as many as you and many of our listeners can relate to. And, but for me, it was almost prescriptive in that when I had the first conversation after the initial, you know, the mammograms and the biopsy, I had to do an MRI led biopsy and some additional testing. And based on I was I was triple positive. And so that, you know, extra positive on the estrogen, very high on the progesterone and then the her to positive. So they said we have to start with chemo right away. But then they said, We're going to do six rounds of chemo, then you're going to actually have a lumpectomy? Okay, then we're going to do 20 radiation, and then you're going to do 14 more rounds of chemo. So now it's like

this was their plan. This was the type of cancer you had and what stage they found it in and all of that. So it was it was really truly around your diagnosis.

Yes. And they said, because so. So there was this aggressive nature, but they caught it early. So they said we're going to do that chemo first. But I was surprised at my own reaction, because I didn't want to be faced with decisions I didn't know how to make. But then when she laid out this plan, like it was you're going to take two aspirin and call me in the morning. I was literally like, wait a minute, how are we going to talk about this? Like, is it just a lumpectomy? And based on it, it was on my right breast on the right on the outer side. And she said, it's it's a straight forward location. We believe we can get it all. And and that was just the plan. And I didn't want radiation at the time, as we talked about, and women that sit in that episode are very fearful of radiation. So I said, What if I don't want to do radiation? And the response was simply, why would you not?

Yeah, I love when they say things like that. We need more explanation. Yeah, right. And don't I want the listeners to know that. When something is said like that to you question it. No, I want answers. You are the patient you are, you know, the one who's going through this. At times we accept what an answer is, yeah, without really stopping and saying, Whoa, timeout here, I have to think let me think

and we go home with our frustration and our concern and quest rights and that it's so glad you added that and I went up my my daughter is an RN and was with me in there and she said she could she knew my fears and my concerns. And she said to the surgeon, well, if What if she got a double like got the mastectomy? And the surgeon said well, then she wouldn't have to do radiation. But why would you do that again? Right. So we pushed and asked some of those questions and I felt like we advocated for me however, the surgeon had made the decision. And I and this is very much something I want to stress for our listeners. I decided to be comfortable with us. You Didn't I want a second opinion? Oh, yeah.

Which

even the approach of just being a lumpectomy, I can't tell you how blessed I feel, because that's that that surgery is obviously much different than, you know, being faced with a double mastectomy and taking both breasts. But I was also of this mindset and fearful of it coming back. And all of the stories you hear too many stories. Exactly. And so I, I just I thought, You know what, I'm leaning even towards a double mastectomy, because A, I want to have to do radiation and potentially deal with the long term side effects of that and be, again, more stories. And be, it's just automated. Right. But Dena, here's the interesting part. When I went to get my second opinion, the oncologist I went to Dr. Bloom, put a plug in for him. He's amazing. He was at the time at the Minnesota oncology. And I, he's now my oncologist at the Masonic Cancer Center, but he listened to what I had to say. And he looked at my case, and he said, and I quote, If you given your whole situation, if you decided to get a double mastectomy, you would be doing it out of fear. And I stopped in my tracks, and I was just like, and he said, You have a 10% chance of it coming back. And he said, given your given the way the chemo has been working, like he just said, this is he said, This is a very straightforward lumpectomy surgery. I hadn't said, I won't judge you if you want to do it, he said, but I will say many women that don't have to that do do it out of fear of it not coming back, and he said Believe me I get it. But yeah, yeah. So that was my I ended up going forward with the lumpectomy. And it went very well. And the radiation was easier than I imagined it would be. So but yeah, all the fears around those decisions. And again, it's back to what you said earlier, too, about ask the questions. Challenge your medical team. Yeah, get second and third opinions. Yeah. So and I know, Dena, your situation is very different. Because your surgeries are much more complicated than what mine was. Yeah. Tell us about yours.

I just want our listeners to know that Maggie and I were both diagnosed with the same exact breast cancer, her to triple positive. My oncologist at the time, well, let's backtrack just a little bit. You went for a second opinion. I went for four opinions. Oh, my goodness, okay, being the nurse and the EMT, you know, my head was just all over the place. And by the fourth opinion, the oncologist said to me, you got to stop doing opinions. And I'm like, Why? Because this is aggressive. And the bottom line is, is that this is spreading into mutating a lot faster than you think.

So you know, so you have to make a choice.

I had to make a choice pretty quickly. And I went with Memorial Sloan Kettering in New York City. And they had satellite offices on Long Island where I was living at the time. And my plan was two months of certain chemo drugs, and then started another set of chemo drugs, and then surgery. So I was diagnosed in October, chemo started in November. My surgery was in April of 2017. And this is what's the protocol and all four opinions had the same exact protocol. So it was chemo a mastectomy. And the reason why it needed to be a mastectomy is because the size of the tumor, it was up against the wall on the inside of the nipple area. And it was in the letter of a C. Oh, ironic is that the letter C? Wow. That is amazing. And the other issue was when they did my first MRI, they did another MRI right before I started my chemo and my tumor doubled in size. Oh my god. So that's when I was like, Oh my goodness. So the chemo drug did shrink my tumor. But they were like it's still a major surgery. It's still a mastectomy. But I opted to do a bilateral mastectomy because All of the data said the same thing. You have a 30% chance of it coming back on the left side, because mine was on the right side as

well. And what did that 30% feel like to you,

like 100% 10%

felt like 95%

was just like, there is no way. And you know, as much as the decision, of course, is the person who's going through it was my decision. But my husband and my two daughters are my rock. And they were like, especially my daughter's mom will get rid of everything. We don't want it to come back, we want you here. And we're going to work through this and we're going to deal with it. You know, and the fear of now losing two breasts, not just one, but two, you know, I do have a little bit of a sixth sense of humor. Like, I don't get new boots, you know, kind of thing. But my surgical journey has been tiresome. I am up to my fourth reconstructive surgery,

I just can't I can't even imagine.

And the fear right now. Which is exactly six years later, I'm faced with one more surgery. There are some issues with pockets in the way I was so sewed up on the inside and the implants move. And, you know, we can get into so many more episodes of, you know, breast implant illness and all kinds of different things that are going on with me right now. So I have to take a step back and say, What do I want? You're faced with another surgery. You know, and it's it becomes difficult that time

and weighing fears on both sides exam of the decision, right?

Yes. Do I get them fixed? Do I go flat? Will? Will I feel like a woman? Will anybody noticed that? I'm flat will 10 years from now will I need another surgery? Will the pockets rip open again? Like there's just so many things going through my mind right now. So fear of surgery once again is at the forefront? Do I think about it every single day? No, I don't. I kind of push it to the backburner.

When you have no time before this next console, you make the decision. So that's got to be hard because you're sort of you're you're waiting.

Yes. And I'm actually looking. We talked about healing by storytelling and healing by community. So I'm bracing a community right now where women didn't ask to have implants put in their flat. So I'm embracing that and learning and growing with them. You know, and then people are like, Oh, no, you need you need to look like a woman. It doesn't define me. And that's what I want our listeners to know, the decisions we make for ourselves is for ourselves. And nobody else.

Oh, yeah, you can go out and fight a million opinions. Exactly. But I love what you said there, Deena about surrounding yourself with people with that shared experience and stories that will help you make the decision and or feel comfortable or not comfortable, right? Like it'll lead you help me knew and the direction you want to go based on backing Right.

Like we said in the beginning of the episode about, you know, triggers that, you know, if you want to listen to this episode, or it's triggering you that you can't listen to it, at this moment, just clicked for me because going into some of these communities, there are things that trigger others. Because we hear so many different stories. And it's very important for us, Maggie and myself to make sure that people feel comfortable in the community that they're in. It's very good. Like it's not a community that you feel comfortable. It's okay to leave that community and find another community. And maybe if that one doesn't work, there's another community, just like the opinions we all got the second opinion, the third opinion, because we have to feel comfortable and be able to heal.

Yeah, I love that. You said that too. Because for example, By you talked about to you, you're you're you're feeling like your breasts don't define you. And so that opinion of someone telling you, you have to have breasts, you're a woman don't get rid of your womanhood when you're for you. You're not right, if you're doing that. And what's interesting is, as you were saying that I was thinking back to when I was facing my decision. Again, I felt so blessed that I had the option to not go the route of the double mastectomy. And I found myself looking in to communities of like the flatties, and just some of those women that have chosen to stay flat not get implants, right. All I saw was admiration. But I also saw if I have the ability to not choose that at this point. It's just such a blessing. It just overwhelmed me with that when you when you send that so yeah, I mean, I think community is everything. And I feel like in the in the breast cancer world, I've never, ever felt so much immediate connection with other women going through similar experiences, but also everybody having such different specific right, journeys, right. Like, there's so many different things.

Yeah, there are so many things. And when we fear surgery, there's this still another, there's many layers to it. And the layer that I'm going to speak about now is really about your significant other. You know, it's difficult for your significant other to watch you first of all go through this process or this journey, and to have certain scars, and things don't fit right, or, you know, there's there's numerous things so people have no issues with their implants, some people don't have multiple surgeries. Some people don't like their scars. There are significant others out there that they don't know how to help you get through this, because they might be having certain issues with cells about the way that we look.

Yes. You mentioned earlier to so my husband and daughter or my rocks, and my husband, when I was going through that decision, did not for one millisecond, want me to imagine keeping them for him? Because he wanted me to do what ever we needed to do. And whatever I felt comfortable. Right I to get to the other side of this right. So I I commend him for for, to your point, like just what do we need to do to get to the other side of this? And this is your decision to make? And how can we help you make it and how can I support you through it. And then once I did make my decision, he has joked about got to keep the boobs. But But to your point, it is a real thing with your spouse with your significant other and it's just it's a very important thing to when you can have those conversations have them.

It was only gonna get a little vulnerable right now, because it was tough for my husband. You know, there are significant significant others that are out there that are I'm going to just say it a boot guy and ask, you know, my guy wouldn't you know, hair thing, whatever it is. And he was like your husband as well, Maggie about you know, everything's your decision. I'm here to support you. But he felt like, and I'm gonna be honest, he felt like my implants is not Dina. They're not. They're like, not attached to me. If this makes any sense to anybody. Oh, my goodness, they're, they're not they're not Deena. They're not. They're not you. That's not part of you. You lost the part of you. Wow. And he couldn't fix me either. That's one thing that my husband, you know, even when I was delivering one of our babies, he they pushed him to the back wall and said you just stand there, and he's a fixer. So he's like, what, what, what can I do? And during my journey, he's like, how do I help you? How do I fix you? How do I you know, and you know, I'm going to be truly honest that he, we talk about it all the time is that it's hard for him to touch them and look at them because it's not He doesn't, I mean, I'm gonna be married. I was 35 years, you know, yeah, he loves me supports me whatever decisions I've ever made. He's got my back. But it's something that he needed to deal with. It's like

a foreign thing introduced that he's feels uncomfortable with. Yes.

Yes, wow,

thank you for sharing.

Be honest with you, I told you, our audience is gonna get to know me, I got a little bit of a sixth sense of humor, I would take his hand and make a touch Mabou.

Let's, let's take this a step at a time here.

You know, and he has shown me such support and love. And I want our audience to know that it's not like, you know, I have issues with our relationship, it's far from that. It's just being able to get through this compensation.

Well, and I love that you shared it, because that is such a real potential. For many of us, when you think about the concept of losing them and not having any and or getting implants, which again, is such a personal decision. It does. In fact, it has influence.

And to take it even one step further. I'm facing the decision of going flat. And we and I've had, I sat him down and had a very long conversation about it. And he was like, I just can't see you keep going through surgeries. It breaks my heart to see you go through another surgery. I don't care about them. I don't care about boobs.

Yeah.

I love who you are on the inside. And I need you to be healthy and happy. And if you're not healthy and happy, then what do we have? You know, and it's not easy to talk about these things.

No, and actually, that's not I was just gonna say that, because when I think about our listeners out there, some don't have a significant other, which, and then some that do may not. It may not be natural to have these kinds of conversations. So it really is about trying to trying to go there and trying to ask the questions. And and just

this is it helps so much also a conversation, whether you're married, whether you're engaged, whether you're living with somebody, whether you your significant, other is the same sex as you, it doesn't matter. The relationship is the relationship, right? And these are what we call taboo conversations that nobody wants to have. Right?

Well, and I remember we had remember the webinar we had where there was a woman who had she was starting to date. Yes. And now she was facing going into the dating world. And what do you like, start off with that conversation?

A little bit about it. But you're right. It's true. Like how do we, how do we navigate conversations, when you start to have feelings for somebody? Or you're you're out there in the world now?

Yeah, I'm seeing I'm seeing a few new episodes in my head about best guesses as to why right. But I feel like I you know, you and I both had such different surgery experiences and the decisions and it's it is to emphasize that we both had different oncologist, different medical teams, different, same diagnosis, but different treatments, plans, because of the level of it and or when caught and all those things. But the point is making you always say it's so well, Dina, it's like the choice is yours. Make sure you get the opinions, but also make sure to challenge your medical team, stand up for yourself, make sure you are comfortable with the decisions you make about this.

Yeah. It's a decision that needs to be made. From your core, your heart, your mindset, you know, because I've heard stories and once again, we talk about stories that I didn't do it for me. I did it for this one. I did it for that one. I did it. Yeah. And the outcome might not be as good. outcome can be good. You know, it all depends on on everybody's situation, everybody's uniqueness. And I can't emphasize enough that we are so different. Every individual out there is so unique and so different. And once again, the choice is yours.

Yeah. And I just have to add this because it seems was just so aligned to this conversation when you think about the surgery we're talking about has to do with a core part of our feminine knee. And there's a lot there to navigate. But there's also a lot, a lot more ways to bring out our feminism and to nurture ourselves. And so that's a part in a piece of all of this. Right? So

and also, the anatomy of breasts are covering our heart. So that whole heart centered feeling really needs Yes. Nurturing needs to be. What's the best way to put it? It needs to be it needs to be first. Yeah, no need to be first. I love that.

I love it. All right. Well, on that note, I feel like that was a fabulous conversation once again, and thank you to our listeners. Yes, thank