My Experience with Breast Cancer: Iya Bakare

Thursday, 29 September 2011 02:30 Written by  Iya Bakare

I always saw it as a blessing and a curse that I never saw the face of death until I was 22 years old when my grandmother died. I recalled having nightmares as a teenager that my mother died. I wasn’t expecting to hear less than a year after losing her mother that there was a threat I could lose my own too.

After I completed my finals for the fall semester of my senior year of undergrad, my mom came to my dorm room to pick me up and take me home for the holiday break. I couldn’t wait to see my mommy, eat her home-cooked meals, take a much-needed vacation from cafeteria food and return to my comfy queen-sized bed at home.


As my mom sat on my twin-sized bed minutes after she arrived at my dorm, I had a feeling she had something extremely important to talk about.

“I have something to tell you baby,” she said, as she rested her hand on my thigh. “I have a little breast cancer, and I’m scheduled for surgery on Tuesday.”

“What?!” I exclaimed. “When did you discover this? How did you discover this? I thought you just had a mammogram a few months ago, and you said you were fine!”

My mom proceeded to tell me her mammogram did confirm she was fine, just three months prior, but one day two months after the exam, she felt something odd near one of her breasts as she took a shower. Mommy said she made an appointment with her doctor, underwent another exam, and it was confirmed she had a small lump on her right breast. She told me the cancer was in its first stage, so she “only” had to undergo a lumpectomy. At that time, I didn’t realize how much of a blessing it was that it was discovered at an early stage. All I could think was that I could lose my mommy and experience what she suffered less than a year prior. Was my nightmare becoming a reality?

I can count on one hand how many times I was speechless in life, and this moment was definitely one of them. I had several questions, but I couldn’t formulate the words and articulate them into complete thoughts and coherent sentences.  As I attempted to get my words together, my mom sprung on me she knew for a month and told everyone in my family, except me. She said because I am a sensitive person and I was weeks away from finals, she didn’t want to distract me and swore my family members to secrecy.

“I have a positive attitude baby and I’m going to beat this,” she said as she wiped my tears. “It really is going to be okay.”

As much as I didn’t want to walk away from my mom at that moment, I needed a minute to digest everything that just transpired. I told her I was going to take a walk and would be back in a few minutes. I walked into the hallway and called my best friend Eric. He consoled me and told me what I already knew: I need to be there for her.

So, I returned to my room about 15 minutes later and told my mom, “I’m here for you, and I’m not going anywhere.”

A few days later, we made the trip to the hospital for her procedure. I kissed her forehead and told her I loved her before they wheeled her to surgery. What lasted almost two hours felt like two days. I recalled the anxiety my family and I felt months prior when my grandma was hospitalized before she passed. I watched as a doctor delivered the dreadful news to a family that their loved one didn’t survive, and my heart dropped. I felt as if I was grieving all over again. Minutes later, I received the call my mom was out of surgery, was in recovery, and I could go back and see her.

She was drugged up, but Mommy recognized her baby. I spent the night by her side and helped her get her IV untangled from the bed post so she could go to the restroom and rid herself of the anesthesia that didn’t agree with her. I interrogated her doctor and oncologist about everything we needed to know and made sure I had contact numbers in case I had follow-up questions.

The next day, we went home and the next week or two seemed like Freaky Friday in a sense where I was the mother and she was the daughter. I slapped her hand every time she tried to lift anything more than 10 lbs. By the end of my Christmas break, Mommy regained most of her strength and most of the soreness subsided, but I didn’t want to leave her. I knew she would start her six and a half week radiation treatment soon, and I wanted to be there for her, but I couldn’t because of school. It was at that moment I realized what I wanted to do for spring break. I didn’t want to go to the beach (did that the semester prior)––I wanted to spend my mom’s last week of radiation treatment with her. And I did.

For six and a half weeks, my mom drove an hour and a half to and from her hospital to receive her radiation treatments five days a week. I always saw her as this Superwoman, but I never realized how strong she was until this experience (even though we’ve endured so much more together).

Six years later, my mommy is breast-cancer free. Secretly (and perhaps not so secretly), we both wonder if it’ll return, but we’re not worried about it. We know we can handle it.

 

Iya Bakare

Iya Bakare

Iya Bakare, GMO's managing editor, earned both her Bachelor and Master of Arts degrees in print journalism. She earned her B.A. from Delta State University with a minor in English and graduated with a M.A. degree from Columbia College Chicago. In her spare time, the Chicago native continues to freelance and ponder ways to both inform and improve her community one story at a time.

She can be contacted at Iya@glossmagazineonline.com
Follow her on Twitter: @ibakare

Website: www.iyabakare.com