I thought lump was old rugby injury.. it was breast cancer
A DAD was stunned when what he thought was a “rugby injury” turned into breast cancer more than 30 years later.
Angus McKay said he first noticed a lump on his left chest in his late teens but as a rugby player and black belt karate enthusiast, just thought he’d torn a muscle playing.
But when the 50-year-old was working offshore in Norway last year, he began waking up with a “burning and itching” sensation on his chest and noticed the lump had got bigger.
The dad of two credits wife Helen with “saving his life” as she urged him to get it checked out and he was eventually diagnosed with cancer in March and had a left mastectomy.
Angus is keen to raise awareness breast cancer can happen to men and urges those with suspicious lumps to get them looked at.
Angus, of Fyvie, Aberdeenshire, said: “I’ve had a little lump on my left side as long as I can remember and never thought anything of it as it never really caused any problems.
“I’ve always been fit and active but in the breast area always had a bit more fat. I did eight years of karate and then played rugby at university for four years.
“I just thought I’d torn a muscle slightly and it healed with a little scar lump. I thought the lump could have come from playing rugby. I used to play wing so I’d get thrown the ball and told to run and then you get piled on, so you end up at the bottom of a ruck.
“It must have been lying dormant.”
The offshore drilling supervisor said he first noticed the lump when he was aged 16-18 and it was about half the size that it ended up being when it was removed.
Angus said: “But at the end of last year when I was working offshore I was lying on my left side and waking up with a burning, itching sensation and noticed the lump had got a bit bigger and elongated.
“I noticed discomfort on the trip before and didn’t really think about it. It was more an annoyance than anything else.
“I mentioned it to my wife because her mum had gone through two rounds of breast cancer and she said, ‘Well, let’s get it checked’.
“I credit her for saving my life. I was in two minds whether to say anything at all to her. In Helen’s words, ‘If I’d left it another three or four months, then it could have been an entirely different outcome’.”
Angus had a mammogram just before Christmas, before going offshore for work again. He got a call from the doctor while he was away telling him to come in and he so after he returned to Scotland in February.
Angus said: “They had a look at it and took three biopsies in March. A week later they said, ‘It’s estrogensensitive cancer and we need to operate’.
“It was a shock ... It’s turned our world upside down to be honest.”
After his mastectomy, no trace of cancer was found elsewhere so Angus didn’t need to have chemo.
He will have annual mammograms and is also taking tamoxifen for a minimum of five years.
Angus said: “I was aware men could get breast cancer but thought it was so rare it was unlikely to really be me.
“When I told a my friends they were like, ‘But you’re a bloke?’ I think quite a few of them didn’t know that men could get breast cancer.”
It was a shock.. it turned our world upside down ANGUS McKAY ON HIS CANCER DIAGNOSIS