Ashley Green

Living with MBC

I guess you can say what was supposed to be the start of any 25-year-old’s life, mine did a complete 360. I finally received the job that I waited on for months, in school studying social work with only a year left. Finally putting my foot down and leaving my toxic ex.

Things were starting to look up for me, so I thought. March 2019 sung a different tune for me and my loved ones. On my right breast I noticed a lump on December 2018. My first thoughts were, “It’s just a cyst. I have nothing to worry about.” After being reminded by family members to go see a doctor about my suspicious lump, I finally made an appointment

March 2019 (3 months into discovering the lump) if looks could kill, I’d be dead. My doctor immediately set me up for an ultrasound. From the ultrasound they did a mammogram the same day, nervous as heck, I was still optimistic. After the mammogram I was seated in this room awaiting my results from the doctor. I remember her simply telling me, “We found mass in your breast.”

Uneducated on breast cancer, I was still lost on what was happening. It’s like she didn’t want to tell me upfront that I had cancer. It was like my results scared her out of the room. A biopsy was performed that same visit, and three days later, I was diagnosed with stage IV ductal carcinoma.

My cancer metastasized to my bones; I received those results the next month (April). Now at the age of 26, I think back and wish that I took what I discovered more serious. I wish the starting age to receive mammograms started at 18. Young women can get breast cancer too, it doesn’t wait until we’re 40.