In May 2013, I made a discovery that scared the daylights out of me. I had unusually sore boobs but when my man and I had sex the pain went away for a while. Even though my right breast was pretty sore, I enjoyed him sucking it till I orgasmed as I had many times before. As the timing was right for me, I put the discomfort down to worse than usual PMS, until after my shower.

As I was applying my moisturiser, a hunch told me that something was wrong. I was more conscious of the pores of my breast and so I Googled "orange peel skin". Well, my breast didn't look like the pics of that, but there were many references to redness, so I grabbed a mirror and to my horror, there was a red circle under my right nipple. It was a symptom of Inflammatory Breast Cancer, a highly aggressive form of breast cancer with a lower than average survival rate and a high recurrance rate. My gut said this is what I had but my common sense said "no, Flames, you don't Google your symptoms, you twit. You just had sex, Mr Flames probably bruised you". So I decided to watch and wait for a week or two.

During the next couple of weeks I just about sent myself crazy with worry. The redness didn't disappear and the classic peau d'orange started to appear. My pain remained on that side even after my period so I knew it was time to see the doctor. It wasn't a pleasant feeling when, after examining me, his voice was shaking. An urgent mammogram and an ultrasound were booked, followed by an appointment with a surgeon. My fears were then confirmed: I did indeed have Inflammatory Breast Cancer. Mr Flames and I were devastated, as well as chemotherapy, I would lose my breast.

As Inflammatory Breast Cancer involves the skin, treatment involves chemotherapy first to control the spread before surgery, so I endured 5 months of chemotherapy, including all the sickness and problems that went with it. By the end, all the redness had disappeared and even though I still had a lump, it had shown signs of shrinkage, so I was scheduled for surgery in early February 2014. After I'd healed sufficiently from the mastectomy, I had 30 rounds of radiation to my chest.

At this stage I have no evidence of cancer and am on a waiting list for reconstructive surgery. Due to the aggressive radiation, I am not a candidate for implants and have only been given a choice of a "Lat flap" from my back or a "Tram flap" from my tummy. Both types involve lengthy operations and up to 3 months recovery as well as follow up surgery to balance the boobs, create a nipple etc. Even though I expect to be called up soon, I am very likely to postpone any further surgery as treatment and recovery have already stolen over a year of my life and I'm not ready to be sick again so soon. So, who wants pics of a Uniboob?

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