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Test Those Breasts ™️
This podcast by Jamie Vaughn is a deep-dive discussion on a myriad of breast cancer topics, such as early detection, the initial shock of diagnosis, testing/scans, treatment, loss of hair, caregiving, surgery, emotional support, and advocacy.
These episodes will include breast cancer survivors, thrivers, caregivers, surgeons, oncologists, therapists, and other specialists who can speak to many different topics.
Disclaimer: I am not a doctor and not all information in this podcast comes from qualified health care providers, therefore does not constitute medical advice. For personalized medical advice, you should reach out to one of the qualified healthcare providers interviewed on this podcast and/or seek medical advice from your own providers.
Test Those Breasts ™️
Episode 91: Finding Strength & Community in Challenging Times w/ Kerry Kelly
Kerry Kelly's journey from breast cancer diagnosis at age 29 through treatment to survivorship captures the essence of resilience and community support. She shares valuable insights on early detection, personal transformation, and the importance of connection during challenging times.
• Kerry’s lump discovery during pregnancy
• Transition from diagnosis to treatment
• Coping strategies during isolation
• Emotional toll of losing hair
• Challenges faced post-treatment
• Importance of community support and groups, such as Evoke Warriors and Cancer Community Clubhouse
• Early detection as a key to survival
• Kerry’s role in advocating for healthcare resources
• The transformative power of sharing stories
• Call for action: Connect and engage with communities
Contact Kerry:
IG: kerry_ann_kelly
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I am not a doctor and not all information in this podcast comes from qualified healthcare providers, therefore may not constitute medical advice. For personalized medical advice, you should reach out to one of the qualified healthcare providers interviewed on this podcast and/or seek medical advice from your own providers .
Hello friends, welcome back to the Test those Breasts podcast. I am your host, jamie Vaughn. I'm a retired teacher of 20 years and a breast cancer thriver turned staunch, unapologetic, loud supporter and advocate for others, bringing education and awareness through a myriad of medical experts, therapists, caregivers and other survivors. A breast cancer diagnosis is incredibly overwhelming, with the mounds of information out there, and other survivors A breast cancer diagnosis is incredibly overwhelming, with the mounds of information out there, especially on Dr Google. I get it. I'm not a doctor and I know how important it is to uncover accurate information, which is my ongoing mission through my nonprofit. The podcast includes personal stories and opinions from breast cancer survivors and professional physicians, providing the most up-to-date information. At the time of recording Evidence, research and practices are always changing, so please check the date of the recording and always refer to your medical professionals for the most up-to-date information. I hope you find this podcast a source of inspiration and support from my guests. Their contact information is in the show notes, so please feel free to reach out to them. We have an enormous breast cancer community ready to support you in so many ways.
Speaker 1:Now let's listen to the next episode of Test those Breasts. Well, hello, friends, Welcome back to this episode of Test those Breasts. I am your host, jamie Vaughn, and today, for season four, we're in season four I have a wonderful guest that I was connected to. Her name is Keri Kelly, and Keri Kelly works for Renown Health here in town, and I just am so excited that I got connected to her because she's got quite a story to tell.
Speaker 1:So Carrie is a loving mom of two and a triple negative breast cancer survivor. Her daughter was born before her diagnosis and her son came after treatment, giving her a unique perspective on how cancer can reshape life. This journey has instilled in her a deep appreciation for resilience and the importance of finding joy in the little moments. Carrie is passionate about sharing her story to support others facing similar challenges, offering encouragement and insights on parenting and survivorship. She channels this passion into her work as a community health advocate, striving to improve the well-being of underserved populations. In her free time, keri finds inspiration and balance in the outdoors, exploring the beauty of Tahoe with her family, embracing nature as a source of strength and renewal. Well, it sounds like we have a lot in common here, Keri. How are you doing?
Speaker 2:I'm great, Jamie. Thank you so much for having me. This is really exciting to be able to share my story.
Speaker 1:Yeah, for sure I. You know I interview a lot of people that are outside of my area, you know, all over the United States and actually even all over the world. So it's always nice to connect with my local community because then I get to share all of the goodness that we have, especially things that are actually coming to our community, which is cool. So when we talked a couple of days ago, you shared with me. Well, first of all, we were connected by a friend of ours, amanda. Well, I mean, amanda worked in the infusion center and she and I became really good friends and so she connects me to people all the time and I feel very fortunate for being connected to you, because you have some important work that you do. But it also turns out that you are a breast cancer survivor and so of course, I want to hear your story, want my audience to hear your story. So maybe we can just start out with letting us know who Carrie Kelly was before breast cancer. Like who was this girl?
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's hard to remember. Honestly we talked about that in our conversation a couple of days ago too it's hard to remember who the person was before going through this significant change in life, which isn't always a negative. So I was diagnosed with cancer in 2020. So it is a little bit of an interesting time period because we're looking at Carrie before cancer, we're looking at Carrie before motherhood, we're also looking at Carrie before COVID, and so all of those things combined are very different. My husband and I got married in 2017 and we did a lot of traveling. We were enjoying being newlyweds and we purchased our first home and had our dogs.
Speaker 2:I was a dog mom before. I was a human mom and I was just trying to focus on my career and trying to focus on helping the community to the best of my ability. I was working at the Food Bank of Northern Nevada, so that was really rewarding work boots on the ground and able to get a lot of hungry tummies fed, in their words. So that's awesome. Yeah, it was. It was an interesting time period and a lot less stressful than my life is now.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you, probably you didn't picture any of that, all that happening one day. Your, your whole entire story turned upside down. And I want to remind people we're actually recording on what is today. Yeah, today's the third, and tomorrow is world cancer day. So you know, most of my audience knows that I'm a lemonista with Know your Lemons. I teach breast cancer classes, bring awareness and all of that. And tomorrow we are turning all of our profiles upside down to kind of signify this the day. Our world just sort of turned upside down. And so here you are, a young couple, you've got their whole life ahead of you and bam. So what can you tell us about your diagnosis? How did that all come about? How did you find it? What were your treatments? Like all the things?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I will start from the very beginning, because I think it's important to make young women aware. I was washing myself in the shower and felt a bit of a lump when I was six months pregnant and there was a lump in my breast because I was pregnant, my breasts were changing a lot, there was a lot changing within my body, I was growing a human being. So I felt the lump and I did Google it and it was like breast cancer during pregnancy and it was this really scary thing that I honestly just brushed off and I didn't think about that moment until I had already been diagnosed and I said, wow, I had this intuition way back a year ago. So when my daughter was about six months old, I had the same lump that I had had from six months of pregnancy to six months postpartum and it became kind of clear that it was not a milk duct. I had thought, oh, my milk has dried up and I did have a ton of challenges when breastfeeding and it just became clear that I needed to get this checked out. So I did, and I was 29 years old and I was actually declined a mammogram. They don't mammogram ladies under 30. And so that was a little bit stressful in the advocacy piece had to come out like I I have a lump and I need to get a mammogram. So we did an ultrasound and then we did a mammogram and it was a diagnostic mammogram. So the doctor came in the room and, to be completely honest, I don't remember much of that conversation. I just knew that it sounded bad and I didn't know what to expect. I hadn't heard anything about this entire world of breast cancer.
Speaker 2:So I was diagnosed the following Monday with stage one cancer and at that point the outlook looked a bit more simple than it ended up being. I had planned on getting surgery and then radiation and it was a very minimal amount of radiation and then I would be done. And once we got into surgery and had the actual results from the pathology in surgery, the mass was much different than they initially thought it was from the biopsy, which bumped it up to stage two and also required chemo. So in the introduction you said triple negative. So that just means it's free from any hormones. That could be a key, so to speak, to have treatments be able to affect it. So chemo is really the main treatment for triple negative breast cancer and that was in my path. So that's when I started chemotherapy and it was just around the first round of chemo that the world ended up shutting down from COVID.
Speaker 2:So of course I was in this very lonely time in my late 20s, going through cancer, and then everybody's lives got turned upside down with this world pandemic, so definitely a huge challenge for myself and my family. We ended up taking my daughter out of daycare for fear of getting sick. My husband was worried about going to work. My mom actually moved in, which was a godsend. It was amazingly helpful so she was able to watch my daughter and I. I mentally checked out a bit. So I got to work and I mentioned briefly at that that time. I worked for the Food Bank of Northern Nevada and I was lucky enough to be able to continue working from home during that period of time and so I was doing food stamp applications with people over the phone and helping to feed our community. It was a method that I needed. To mentally stay sane was to help other people. I was in the hardest time of my life and I needed to do something that felt meaningful.
Speaker 1:It's amazing how much that helps.
Speaker 2:It really does, yeah, and it's now obviously many therapy sessions later. I know that I was kind of avoiding what was going on in my actual life, but it was helpful during that time, which which is great.
Speaker 1:So, so, so, going through, wow, I often think to myself what it would have been like to go through cancer and have to do all the chemo and things like that during COVID, because you can't have a lot of people around, which you know for me. I'm a social person, so I would have wanted people around, of course, but people I've. I've interviewed quite a few people who had cancer during COVID and it definitely was a different type of beast, for sure, for sure, and that was so good that your mom was able to move in and very helpful.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I was actually one of the lucky ones because I was able to get my surgery done before COVID hit, because during that time they were canceling breast surgeries, which is absolutely devastating. There's there's a lot of people that weren't able to have surgery for months and months because it wasn't considered life altering or life risking or something of that verbiage.
Speaker 1:So well, and then I wonder how many people you know had to put that off and their cancer went to a different stage.
Speaker 1:Yeah yeah, because of that. Yeah, just horrifying, absolutely horrifying. So you went through chemo, um, and all the things lost your hair, um, had the side effects, and I I do want to go back to one thing that you said was that you know your cancer, you know your diagnosis, and all of that definitely turned out to be a little different than you had expected, because from what you were first told and I, you know that is the thing is is that when we are diagnosed with something like this, it never goes in this straight line right. There's always a detour, and all the way through and that's definitely what happened to me Now in our conversation the other day was it you that was telling me that really, your journey didn't start until after all the treatments and everything. And I'll let you explain that because I totally get it. Some people don't get it, especially people just who've never had it, or like the caregivers. But can you explain what you meant by that?
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, so I, during the March April time period in 2020, I did go through my my full rounds of chemo and then ended my journey with 28 rounds of radiation in June of 2020. And so I do want to talk about losing my hair. Okay, let's talk about that now, because that was a big, a big thing. As a woman, as a young woman, it was definitely one of the hardest parts, which sounds insane. You have this lifealtering challenge that you're dealing with and you have to go through all these medical changes, and your hair is something that you're you're thinking about, but it really affected me and it really affected the way that I thought of myself and, looking back, I feel like that's one thing that I wish.
Speaker 2:I would have been just nicer to myself during that time. Losing my full head of hair and then my eyebrows, my eyelashes, just took away the femininity that I felt like I had, and from the full spectrum of showing my face on work calls to being intimate with my husband, everything changed and it just it altered the way I viewed myself and I would I want to say that I would rock it more if I were to have to go through this again, because I was so beautiful even with no hair, and the journey was beautiful. All of the hair regrowth cycles um, they looked great and so, right, yeah, it's. Um, I feel like uh, that's one thing that I would be nicer to myself if I were to go back, so well, it is so hard and it's so devastating when you think to yourself.
Speaker 1:Because when we think cancer and chemo, obviously right away we think of, am I going to lose my hair? And I remember asking my oncologist that and she said yes, and I just, you know, I, I, I was like I, I didn't think that I was going to be pretty anymore or whatever it was, Cause I've always had long blonde hair for as long as I can remember.
Speaker 1:And but all of the but I I got through it once. Once I was able to take control of the way I lost my hair, which I did I. I cut my hair in this bad-ass haircut and then I my husband and another friend shaved it and I just sort of embraced it. And I never wore wigs. I got a wig but I never wore them. I wore beanies or whatever, and or I just walked around the house bald.
Speaker 2:Exactly, yeah, it looks, it looks great, and it's the time period that we're in, so well, and now I can understand.
Speaker 1:I had an older friend of mine who had cancer breast cancer years ago, um, and she had lost her hair.
Speaker 1:And I remember when I was verbalizing cause I'm a very open person online, um, you know, on my forum and um, I was, you know, really showing how upset I was about it, Like I was crying, I was really upset and she sent me a message and she said, oh God, Jamie, she goes, why are you getting so upset about? Like, this is no big deal and and on one hand, I'm like I can see where she's coming from now, but on the other hand, it's not really something. I would say something to someone, like I would tell them you know what I felt the same way and it was really hard and and I and it did take me a while to get through it and in the end, you know, obviously I did. So you get to feel all the feels, the way you get to feel them. So, yeah, it was pretty interesting. So then you finish your treatments and all of that. Then what happened in your survivorship, New into your survivorship?
Speaker 2:Yes, brand new.
Speaker 2:So there is this weird thing that happens when you're going through a medical event and you have all eyes on you for, however, the time period is that you're going through that event.
Speaker 2:It's medical oncology, it's surgical oncology, it's radiation oncology, it's everybody is calling you and social workers are navigating you through this process and then you get to a point where they say see you in six months and you're like wait, what? What am I supposed to do for the next six months besides freak out? And that was a pretty significant drop off for me because, as I said earlier, I was in a bit of a period of time where I was avoiding what was actually going on mentally-weekly meetings had a lot of therapy and it was really intense to unpack some of those feelings that I had felt during the active treatment journey. And I think that's where I would like to support more people in our community because obviously there's a lot of, there's a lot of light that's shown on folks when they're going through that active treatment and then they get this great news, like you're done, and then it doesn't feel like great news at that time because you just I felt very lost and very confused on where to go next.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I did too, and it was really hard for some people to understand, including my husband. So I, I, you, I don't know. Excuse me, I've got a little sore throat. I don't know whether we talked about this, but how was your husband during this time?
Speaker 2:It was. It was hard. He lost a lot of weight. He kind of retracted from a lot of things going on in his life. I think it affected him more than he wanted to show on the outside. But he internalized a lot of things, as did I. But super supportive to the entire process, as I said. Um, but super supportive to the entire process, as I said it was. It was COVID and we, um, I wasn't allowed to have any guests during my chemo, so, um, he wanted to be there and him and my daughter would FaceTime me at any available opportunity and um, just talk me through the things that I was dealing with. Um, but him and my mom were my number one fans during that time and a huge support system.
Speaker 1:So, um, when you were going through some hard times after the treatments, how was he at that point? Was he understanding, um, and supportive at that point as well?
Speaker 2:Well, I mean, unfortunately, he couldn't understand there was, there was nothing that he could do to understand the situation that I was in, and so that's. I needed a sense of community and I needed a sense of finding people in my life that understood what I was going through, saying things like oh I blew my nose and all of my nose hair came out after my first round of chemo, and you don't say that to people when you're walking down the street. You don't talk to people about those weird things that happen and weird things that change in your life, because they don't get it unless they're a survivor and unless they've been through it. And, um, it is unfortunate in in the fact that, um, I couldn't connect with my husband in that way, but I knew that I needed to find a different community.
Speaker 1:So you did. So tell us about your community, cause you've got some good ones.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah so.
Speaker 2:So at the beginning of 2021, my care coordinator over at Renown let me know about this program.
Speaker 2:It was a brand new program called Evoke Warriors and it was something that was an idea a local gym here in Reno, nevada, called Evoke Fitness and their fearless leader, mena Spadabowski, and so she came up, or she started this program for survivors of all cancer types and both male and female, and it is a nutrition and workout program that helps really just rehab your body after what it's been through in the cancer journey and helps you get strong again.
Speaker 2:And with the nutrition and the working out aside, the strength that I found in the program was the people that I was working out alongside, so it was all different cancer types, so people that went through what we different treatments than I went through. We were able to just talk about the weird stuff and and really that was really important to me because nobody else understood and this community of 24 people understood exactly what I went through and they went through it too, and we could laugh about it, we could cry about it and it was so incredibly helpful Just for for my spirit and, of course, I lost a bunch of weight and felt really healthy. And that was just the cherry on top.
Speaker 1:So I mentioned to you that I interviewed Mena. I want to go ahead and put the episode in my show notes. Mena before I interviewed her through another friend of mine, when Mena was with a different program before she got into Evoke Warriors and, you know, became the fearless leader and then I've had several friends go through that program since then. So so, such a great, such a great community. So how can people get involved with Evoke Warriors?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so super exciting. They are accepting applications for season five of Evoke Warriors and the time is ticking for those applications. So on February 7th is the last day to fill out an application for season five. But Evoke Warriors does a season every single year. So in January the application period opens every year for their six month program. So if you miss it this year you can always try for next year.
Speaker 1:That's awesome. Let's put a link in the show notes for that as well. That sounds great and then also Cancer Community Clubhouse. How are you involved with that? That's another great community. Natalie Stevenson and I interviewed her as well.
Speaker 2:Oh, awesome. Yeah, I got connected with Natalie at Cancer Community Clubhouse. A little bit later in my journey, after I had graduated or done my reveal for Evoke Warriors, I found Cancer Community Clubhouse, which really helped me in a bit of a different part of my journey and helped in the exact same ways. It's that community. It's talking to people who have been through what you've been through and learning how to continue on with life in a normal way with people who you just get along with, and that was really impactful and important to me to just go to lunch with other breast cancer survivors and to do things that felt fun and took our minds off some of the challenging pieces of our cancer journey. But at that point, after I had gone through Evoque Warriors, I was able to get my body healthy enough that my oncologist approved going off some of my medication and trying to have our second baby, and so that was a huge part of my journey.
Speaker 2:It was really challenging, after you have your your first kid and have big dreams of a large family, to be told that you can't have any more children, and so the Cancer Community Clubhouse was a huge resource to me when I was going through that period of time of? Is this going to work? Is it not? Am I going to be able to conceive? What are my resources? Meetings, and had to run and throw up in the bathroom because I was newly pregnant. So I was. I was the first official, or my baby boy was the first official CCC baby, which is I love it, ccc baby.
Speaker 1:So have you? Have you been over to their new space yet?
Speaker 2:Yes, it's so beautiful.
Speaker 1:I have not been there. I've seen pictures. I've got to get over there. I've just the pictures. I'm sure just do do it no justice, so I will definitely get my butt over there. So let's talk about what. So I it's probably safe to say that had you to do that, how'd you if you were to go through this again? You would not turn inwards, you would. You would connect with the community right away.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. Yeah, I think. I think obviously that's a really challenging thing to do when you're going through something deeply personal, personal and challenging just yourself. But the community was so helpful to me and women understanding my, my challenges was was so much more helpful than I thought it was going to be, and I would definitely rely on my network more and that's something that I want to be. For other people is that that network and that person that you can call and talk about whatever you need to talk about in that moment, and I'll be there and I'll understand a small piece of what you're going through.
Speaker 1:Love it. So let's talk about what you do at Renown. What is what's your, what is your specialty there?
Speaker 2:do at Renown? What is what's your, what is your specialty there? Yeah, so my official title is Community Health Program Manager, so I help to connect the healthcare side of Renown with our community nonprofits that do similar work. We like to call our nonprofits partners in health because there's a lot of work being done on the ground and within those nonprofits that are hugely impactful on the clinical side of health. So I really like to use my personal experiences in the cancer world, in motherhood, in overall life life, to help with underserved communities and folks who don't have the resources. That I did navigate these challenging times in their life and that's something that I'm really passionate about is is advocating for folks that can't advocate for themselves.
Speaker 1:Love it that. That's one of my biggest missions as well, and I actually do have people who reach out to me who are underserved, and I'm able to connect them to people who are able to help them out. So I'm glad that I have you, as you know, someone out there that I can can ask questions. Usually I'll I'll call Natalie or I'll call someone over at Nevada Cancer Coalition and they're able to direct me to some place that can help this person out. So it's just nice to have someone else. So thank you for being there and I love that you support the nonprofits as well.
Speaker 1:That's really how you and I were first connected was because our friend Amanda connected me to you and, um, you know, my mission with test those breasts that is now a nonprofit is very small. It's all self-funded off my very robust retirement fund from the school district. That's why I turned it into a nonprofit and I just don't and I don't want to take money from breast cancer patients. It's just not something that I was interested in. People have said, you know, hey, well, you know you can charge for this or do that, and it's like, nope, I don't want to do that. So that is why I applied for the nonprofit last spring and was approved pretty quickly.
Speaker 1:So, it's just my advocacy work. It's and you know we're talking about helping people after a situation that we've been through and to me it's very, very healing. And I, after my first surgery, which was in 2023, it was January of 2023, that I realized that I was not okay. I was in a very deep, dark place of depression and, oh my God, because I was in my first year of retirement, so I retired, had my party.
Speaker 1:Two days or two or three days later, I found out I had breast cancer, or within that week, and so I spent my whole entire first year dealing with breast cancer, and so, when I was all done with all the doctor's appointments and surgeries and all that, I found myself in a very similar situation that you did, and so I thought to myself what am I going to do? Like, what's my purpose? I have nothing to show for this. Like, I am so alone and my husband didn't understand it well at all. We're still married, by the way. Husband didn't understand it well at all. We're still married. By the way, the statistics they say 40% of marriages and relationships break up over a diagnosis like this. So if a marriage can, last through that.
Speaker 2:That's a pretty big deal, right, and he still wanted to have another baby with me.
Speaker 1:That's awesome, yeah, yeah. And my husband made me feel really beautiful when I was bald. All the time he would always want to take selfies because he doesn't have a lot of hair at all, but so we were two baldies. But I really needed to find an avenue and some sort of something, and I was like I had a podcast before I retired for educators. That's what I was going to do in my retirement. And so I thought to myself podcast, because people are like do you want to? You should write a book, you should write a book. And I'm like I don't want to write a book. That's just not something that I wanted to do. And so I said but podcasting I can do. I love having conversations with all kinds of people and this is just something that I really love and I get to give back to the breast cancer community. So I just released my 90th episode a couple days ago.
Speaker 1:So, yeah, so I release every single week. It's just something I'm very focused on and so that did drag me out of the darkness. I will say there is a um, a center coming to Reno and that we're going to, you know, probably talk more, uh, more about with other people. But the Conrad center, yeah, and I've talked about it with Dr Pretty and a couple of other people. This is so exciting.
Speaker 2:Yes, yeah, it is going to be. The Conrad breast center is is going to be an all-encompassing one-stop shop, if you will, for breast cancer and it's going to have a ton of resources for folks undergoing treatment and it's really just going to be a level up for our community and the cancer world. So I definitely want to get somebody that has more knowledge about the center and the information and what we can get excited about in the community, because here in Reno Sparks we struggle when it comes to that excellence piece and Renown is really bringing that clinical excellence to our community, and in several different ways, but especially in the cancer realm.
Speaker 1:So they're going to be doing surgeries over there One of the things that I was talking to Dr Pretty about, because when I had my surgery I didn't want implants and so I went somewhere else to get my surgery. But not everybody could do that Like it's. You know it's, it's expensive. It was expensive for me to do that, but my insurance covered some of it. But not everyone can do the autologous surgeries, like I had the deep flap surgeries. So I was asking Dr Pretty are we trying to get a microsurgeon in Reno? And she says that they are trying to. Um, they need to be very skilled, they need to be someone who eats and sleeps deep flap surgeries or S gap surgeries. You know, you don't want somebody who just does one every once in a while. It's a very complex surgery and um, so I'm just so excited about that. I can't wait until we hear more about that and it's slated to open in May, I believe.
Speaker 2:Yeah, sometime in the spring, which is really exciting. And I think the fact that we're going to have the Center for Patients is amazing. But, as you said, it is going to attract that higher level of physician and not necessarily higher level, but just different specialties than we've had before and level our care up, which is so exciting. The, the amount of talent that we have in the in the cancer realm at Renown is, is just really amazing.
Speaker 1:So, yes, it is, it is, and they're also going to have a mental health. It's good. There's going to be like a holistic feel to it as well. So that really makes me happy for people, because sometimes when you go see your oncologist they're just not very good at providing that holistic care, that empathy that we really need. So having you know different people in the center will be really super helpful. It'll be awesome.
Speaker 1:So one question I do ask people as we wrap up is that you know we all have a really big piece of advice that we would give to someone that has never been diagnosed. And I always want to preface this by saying that most of the audience that I try to attract are people who've never been diagnosed, and one of my friends asked me why that is. He said you know why? Why would you try to attract people who've never been diagnosed? It's not even on their radar, especially if you're younger. Well, carrie, you had breast cancer at age 29. Like who knew that this would happen to you? So I told her. I said yeah, it's not on their radar. And that's the point is, it needs to be on their radar, which is one of the reasons I teach the Know your Lemons curriculum to people who've never been diagnosed, so they understand how to recognize breast cancer. So with that, what would you say to someone who's never been diagnosed? What would that piece of advice be?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I have to go with the very stereotypical it's on the back of my car on my license plate. Early detection is key and I know that sounds silly, but the survival rates for breast cancer are so much higher when those stages are lower, and so it's extremely important, if you feel anything that is abnormal in your breast, making sure to check yourself out in the shower when you're putting on lotion, make sure to do that self exam and go in at the first sign of anything abnormal. I know a lot of people who have put off that appointment because they're too scared of what it might hold, and getting into treatment as early as possible has the best survival rate, and I think that's the main thing that I would I would say over and over is test yourself and go in.
Speaker 1:Well, you know you say that it sounds silly and be, and the reason is is because it's so dang simple Like. It's as simple as that is that early detection is key and guaranteed 100%. If somebody waited, I waited just so. You know, I felt a lump, I felt zingers and hotspots all through the spring leading up to my retirement. Now, why did I not go in right away? Why did I not make a phone call? Because I was so excited and so busy with ending my career that I thought you know what, when I get my mammogram you know, I guess that's what I found I just was like put it in the back on the back burner.
Speaker 1:Had I gone in in the spring, a few months prior, when I first started feeling these things, it probably would have been stage zero or one and I may or may not have had to go through chemo and maybe not even a mastectomy. So you say that it sounds silly and it's silly that someone can look at that and say that sounds silly Because it's just a's. So that's why I here's my lemons that I bring to the know your lemons class. You have to squeeze it hard enough because that's like in real life. You really should feel really get in there. But you can feel a lump in there and it feels very similar to a, a seed in the lemon.
Speaker 2:That's amazing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, so yeah, so early detection.
Speaker 2:I need to get that bumper sticker so yeah, it's, it's the Nevada license plate, the breast cancer, oh, one that you pay for.
Speaker 1:Oh, I need to get that. So you know, Carrie, this has been so great. I'm so glad that we got to have this conversation and, you know, I get to learn more about you and I really look forward to collaborating more with you.
Speaker 1:I mean, if, you ever have something that's might interest me. As far as you know, teaching in you know somewhere in that sphere, just anything to collaborate. I want to be part of that. I love, love, love Renown. Renown has always been good to me. They were good to me when my mom was dying and they were good to me during my infusions that I had to have. I had to have a lot of blood transfusions in infusion. I made such wonderful connections which in turn led me to you, so I'm so grateful.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that clinical excellence is is key when it comes to your cancer journey. So I'm so I'm so happy to be with Renown and to be to be on this podcast and to be able to talk about this entire journey. It's it's been a journey, but it's been a roller coaster, if you will, because I don't I won't go into the toxic positivity and say it's all been positive, but it's been a roller coaster that I would do again, because it's taught me a lot of great lessons and I got my baby boy out of it. So that's one thing that I was going to mention to. If, if anybody listening is interested in the babies after breast cancer idea, there's a lot of groups online, but we don't necessarily have groups here in Northern Nevada, so feel free to reach out to me if you have interest or have questions about fertility after breast cancer.
Speaker 1:That's awesome, and I have your Instagram handle and your email address.
Speaker 1:If there are some resources, websites and things like that, or Facebook groups or whatever that you can put into the resources of the document that I sent you, I will include those, and so I think that would be really, really helpful. All right, carrie. Well, thank you so much again for joining us for this episode and, to my audience, thank you for joining me again, and I really hope that you can head to your favorite platform, rate and review this show. It really does help get the word out to all kinds of people all around the world, and we will see you next time on the next episode of Test those Breasts. Bye for now, Friends. Thank you so much for listening to this episode of Test those Breasts Bye for now, where I can add value, so please reach out if you'd like to collaborate. My contact information is in the show notes and, as a reminder, rating, reviewing and sharing this podcast will truly help build a bigger audience all over the world. I thank you for your efforts. I look forward to my next episode of Test those Breasts rest.
