Verity

What cancer were you diagnosed with?

triple negative breast cancer

What age were you diagnosed?

33

What has helped you to thrive?

Being diagnosed in lockdown has been challenging. Receiving care parcels, cards and such like from friends and colleagues has kept me going. I absolutely love my job and being unable to work hit me hard. Keeping in touch with my boss and fellow managers has meant a lot. Driving home to my family in York for the night to shave my hair off with my sisters was very cathartic.

A recent game-changer for me was signing up to run a marathon across the month of July for charity. I had started to feel physically and mentally trapped inside my own body. I needed something to snap out of it. The donations and support have been absolutely overwhelming. I'm looking forward to doing more to keep myself fit and healthy and I'd love to do another fundraising event post-surgery later in the year. 

Verity's Story

I went to my GP with a painful armpit lump in early April 2020. I was sent home with antibiotics for a suspected cyst. A week later I went back and was given a referral to the breast clinic - with a view to finding out what kind of cyst I had. Even when the nurse told me she felt the lump (one in my breast I hadn't noticed), and even when I had the mammogram...and even when it was biopsied.... I still thought it was a cyst. It was a shock to be told at the end of the appointment that it was highly likely I had cancer. I felt so naive. A week later I went for my formal diagnosis. I have Triple Negative Breast Cancer. Grade 3b, IDC. The lump at time of diagnosis was appx 3cm with several involved lymph nodes. I went for my first Oncology consult on the 22nd of May and started chemo the next day.