Hi Filotimo family!

 

My name is Nastasya and I’m a 31 year old Joburger that sells and specializes in Email and Sms marketing software. 

 

In February 2020 my fiancé and I moved into our first  home together. It was going to be an exciting year in which we made our house our own, planned a wedding and starting planning a family. 

 

In April 2020, about 30 days into lockdown and the Corona madness, I found a lump in my left breast. I immediately knew it was foreign and that something wasn’t right so I booked an appointment to see the gynae a few days later. The gynae assured me that it was probably nothing because it was very fibrous and I’m young. But that an ultrasound would give us peace of mind. So off I went to the breast and bone clinic to get an ultrasound. 

 

The look on the radiologist’s face will probably always haunt me, because she knew right away. And she couldn’t hide it. She said the words “I think we’re in trouble”. And my heart sank.

 

To be extra sure, she did a mammogram, and then straight away, a biopsy. I remember sitting in the waiting room with an ice pack on my bear chest thinking, “What on earth is happening?”.

 

A few days later while cooking dinner, the radiologist called and confirmed my worst fear. I had triple negative breast cancer in my left breast.

 

From that moment on it has been a whirlwind of appointments, surgeries, cat scans, fertility treatments,  oncologists, chemo-therapy, reconstruction, radiation, blood tests and endless COVID tests. 

 

The bully that is triple negative breast cancer, tried to scare me, but I was determined to live!

 

Determined to carry on planning that family I wanted and enjoy my new home. I cried and I broke many times but my smile and my faith never faltered along with the support of my family and friends.

 

I can only hope to share my journey with others and help them get through it too. If I can convince just one other woman to get screened for early detection, I will have done my job.

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