In This Family Nobody Fights Alone

By Brittany Paul

A few weeks before my 37th birthday, I was diagnosed with Invasive Ductal Carcinoma. With no prior family history or education on warning signs, I had no clue there was a chance I could have breast cancer.

During the summer of 2022, I had a few symptoms that I disregarded. I was healthy and in the best shape of my life. When October came around, it felt like everywhere I turned breast cancer just kind of kept coming up. I was sitting in the school pickup line on Monday, October 3rd and kept seeing an influencer I follow discussing her breast cancer journey. She was my age, healthy, and had no family history. I couldn’t get it out of my head and decided I needed to make an appointment. After that, everything escalated very quickly. I saw my primary doctor on Tuesday, had my first mammogram and ultrasound on Wednesday, biopsy on Thursday, and received my breast cancer diagnosis on Friday. I moved swiftly to find the best doctors for me and had a mastectomy at Gibbs Cancer Center in Spartanburg on October 27th. I am currently undergoing 4 rounds of Adriamycin and Doxorubicin, which will be followed by 12 weeks of Taxol. This summer I’ll receive 30 rounds of radiation before my treatment is complete.

We have been truly blessed with an amazing support system and community along this journey. My hope from all of this is to be an inspiration for others to do monthly self checks and always be their own advocate when it comes to their health.