This is 40(three)- Breast Biopsy

I’m writing this to inform and remind women that even though we are a healthy weight and probably live a fairly healthy lifestyle, that getting a regular mammogram is still so important.

Rather than keep you hanging, I have benign tissue that needs to be removed, and I was very lucky to find it early, as left alone it will probably become cancerous. I felt no lump, had no indication that anything was amiss, I am a healthy weight, I try to be mindful of eating a variety of colors of fruits and vegetables, and theres no history of breast cancer in my family.

I was surprised, to say the least, when I got a phone call hours after my regular mammogram. They said there was some calcification and an enlarged lymph node and asked me to schedule another mammogram and ultrasound. 

If you have never had a mammogram, it’s not as bad as you’d think. It’s certainly not comfortable, but it’s mostly just pressure on your breasts. If sore breasts are part of your PMS symptoms, you might want to make your mammogram appointment when you are not suffering from PMS symptoms. Many young, athletic women have dense breast tissue, so you might receive a letter or email letting you know that you have dense breast tissue. This means that the mammogram has a harder time getting clear imaging and you should continue to do manual breast self exams.

A second mammogram and ultrasound a week later confirmed I had some suspicious cells and a swollen lymph node and I would need an ultrasound biopsy of the lymph node and a biopsy of the other calcification area. I went for a stereotactic large core needle biopsy/and an ultrasound guided biopsy of my lymph node.

Thinking that I have run many 100 milers, just had a tooth extracted while awake, I expected this to be a breeze. I was wrong. I had asked around and most people had uneventful biopsies. My experience was that the doctor had a hard time getting the needle through my tissues, she remarked that because I was muscular the tissues didn’t give as easily as her usual population. This is something to note for other athletes, it may take a bit longer for your ultrasound biopsy as it’s done manually and depends on the strength of the practitioner and the fact that many of the lymph nodes are near shoulder muscle tissue. I would say this biopsy took much longer than both myself and the doctor expected. It made my hand fall asleep and my shoulder hurt after from the pressure applied, but didn’t hurt as much after.

It’s like the one negative side effect of LHS. This winter I have been working up to bench pressing 70lbs so my arm and shoulder muscles have more hypertrophy than they usually would.

The second biopsy, a stereotactic biopsy, I was expecting to hurt more. This is where your breast is compressed in the mammogram machine, it helps guide the needle in for the tissue sample. It was a tad more painful, but was over pretty quickly.

Women with dense tissue often experience more pain.

Finally something to note is that we runners are vascular! In running this is a great thing, as we get fitter we grow our vascular system to shuttle oxygen to our muscles and clear and use lactate as well as fuel more quickly. On the other hand, small cuts to your breasts, that are close to our lungs, can bleed quite a bit. The incisions they make are so teeny tiny, but can bleed for quite some time during and after. don’t be surprised if you have to hold pressure for a bit while your blood clots.

You are not allowed to shower for a day or two, I got a sponge bath the first two days. The night after the biopsy I could not get bras on or off and it’s more comfortable to sleep with compression around your chest. I ended up sleeping in a TRI-top because it fully zips on and off so I didn’t need to raise my arms up and it provided compression.

The nurse told me I could go back to normal activities 2-3 days later, but really I found that I was quite sore for 5 days. Even as a small breasted individual it didn’t feel good to move much. I went on a run on the 5th day with a very compressive bra and it felt ok, but that night was sore and throbbing, even with Tylenol. I waited a full week before resuming some light weight lifting, that also didn’t hurt during, but hurt a lot several hours later. (When I say very light I used 8lb weights instead of the usual 15 or more)

I’m currently on day 13 and running an hour is starting to feel pretty ok. I still feel something every now and then when I run or if I lay on my breast but I ran 1:45 and did not have any pain later in the day. Don’t be surprised if it takes a few weeks for the pain to go away if you have to have a biopsy that hits your muscles or if you have dense breast tissue.

An aside, the waiting and the not knowing are exhausting. If you find yourself in this situation, don’t just try to exercise through it to take your mind off of the outcome. I wanted to nap and read and lay on the couch because my head was so full of worry I was too tired to run. This is ok, give yourself grace. Cry if you need, speak to friends and family or find a therapist to talk to. The not knowing is hard. Hopefully if any of you are reading this because you are going through the same thing, you won’t hesitate to reach out if you are in need of chatting with someone. I was able to connect with some other women who have had breast surgeries and just hearing their thoughts and connecting to someone else was really helpful.

Next is an appointment with a breast surgeon.