“Before the operation, I could run for 2 minutes, but now I run 15 km.”

Yulia, 33 years old:

“In my life before 2020, cancer did not exist at all. Only in the news in the media, when they talk about someone, do you think, God, what a pity for people. None of the relatives were sick. 2020, the pandemic began, and we were sent home to work remotely.

My boyfriend and I went to Tver, we had a dacha there. There is the Volga, nature – everything is wonderful, we relax, work, I started running. In May, I began to notice a slight lump in my breast. And before that, I lost a lot of weight, five or six kilograms. I thought it was because I started running. And now I feel a lump on one side and think: strange, maybe it’s a muscle. I didn’t even have the thought of comparing the two breasts.

Then I noticed discharge, and after that, I felt a lymph node in my armpit, on the right side, where the seal is. After that, I went online, and what alerted me was not the tumour or lymph node but the discharge from the nipple. But when I put it all together, I read that these could be symptoms of cancer. When you know this, you start to feel and see that, yes, the breasts are different. Well, that’s all, it became clear that we had to go to Moscow. There, they have just begun to introduce strict pandemic restrictions. But this worked more in my hands, unlike many others. I went through everything almost without queues.

The clinic visit

I arrived at the clinic, where the doctor felt me, took a smear, and sent me for an ultrasound. During the ultrasound, they told me: they say, we don’t like this; go to your doctor; let them give you a direct referral to the Women’s Health Clinic on Presnya. I returned to the gynaecologist, who said: “Don’t worry, I, of course, will give you a referral, but here they scare everyone.” On the same day, I had an ultrasound and mammogram, and the next day, I was scheduled for a biopsy. When I was undergoing a biopsy, an analysis of the scrapings came back: it said that no cancer cells were found.

When the doctor who conducted the examination said: “Another confirmation that you shouldn’t rely on cytology at all,” I tensed up. I found out that I had cancer on the same day as the news that I had coronavirus. Swabs for COVID-19 were taken at the clinic. And so I arrived back at my dacha, and at lunch, they called me and said that I had coronavirus. The biopsy results returned that same day, but no one called me.

The diagnosis

We just sat down with a young man in the evening to celebrate Friday. I checked if the results were ready and went into my account. The results were ready, and in general, everything was written there: “The diagnosis of breast cancer has been confirmed.” I also misread the stage as stage three, although I was at maximum stage two. Then, however, they changed it for me anyway to the initial third. It’s very hard.

When you are examined, no matter what the doctors say, you pray to all the gods to the last: I will do this and that, just so that it is not confirmed. In your mind, you understand that, most likely, yes, but in your heart, you hope it will work out. Of course, I burst into tears. Many thanks to my boyfriend; he was there all the time. There are many cases when men can’t stand it; some girls’ husbands leave them. But everything turned out the other way around for us: I got married three months ago after treatment. I didn’t tell my mother anything until I received all the documents and the treatment plan.

No options

My dad and grandmother live in the LPR (self-proclaimed Lugansk People’s Republic – Izvestia), and I haven’t said anything to them and haven’t told them until now. Grandma is 84 years old. She has had three strokes, but she is doing well; she walks and talks. Dad had a micro-infarction. I understood that this could send my grandmother to the next world and harm my dad. Therefore, when my hair and eyebrows disappeared, I disguised myself for a long time and did not talk to them via video call.

Then, she began to prepare them gradually. She said that I had a bad haircut at the hairdresser, and I decided to shave my head. They still believe that my haircut was bad. I was very lucky in terms of treatment. I didn’t pay a penny anywhere; they didn’t extort or demand anything from me. Everything was provided on time, treatment was not delayed, and all this was within the framework of compulsory medical insurance. Once I changed chemotherapy therapists – we didn’t get along. In addition, they refused to prescribe me a medicine to maintain my leukocyte level: they said, go to your clinic.

Light at the end of the tunnel

As a result, I decided, in principle, to do “chemotherapy” at the clinic, and I am very pleased with it. There was a wonderful doctor there. Because of the pandemic, all quotas were not chosen, and I quite easily got an operation with a good surgeon at the Institute of Radiology in Kaluzhskaya. But what neither the surgeon nor the chemotherapist told me about is that girls often develop lymphedema after such an operation (because after the removal of lymph nodes, lymph fluid accumulates in the soft tissues. – Izvestia). We do not have lymphologist doctors in our clinics. And no one warned me that such a problem might arise, that you might need a special sleeve. I accidentally encountered an open lesson on the Internet with a lymphologist, just at the Further Foundation.

I listened, and it turned out that they have a free school for cancer patients. They tell you everything about lymphedema: how to examine it, treat it, and whether surgery is necessary. I went once a week, and I highly recommend this to anyone facing breast cancer: you won’t be given so much information in any short appointment. I learned about this after the operation, but ideally, all this should be done before. In the end, they advised me to have a good sleeve, and I found a doctor who would then perform surgery on my arm.

Moving forwards

Immediately after the operation, I began to give myself physical activity, although the doctors did not recommend it. I was alone almost all the time in a double ward – again due to the pandemic. I did squats three times a day, leg swings – anything that didn’t stress my arm. Now, I give myself cardio every day. I recently ran 15 km, although, before treatment, I started with two or three minutes of running and was already a little out of breath.

The doctor also tells me this is necessary: only physics will help the body not think it is ageing or in menopause. The longer you live an active life, work, and not bury yourself, the more you will prolong this youth. I personally still plan to have children when this is over.”