Mum ‘too healthy’ to have cancer
When Kate Callaghan felt a lump in her breast, she never thought it could be stage four breast cancer – and neither did her doctors.
As a holistic nutritionist, personal trainer and lifestyle coach, doctors considered the health-conscious 35-year-old mum-of-two too low-risk to have cancer.
‘‘I am healthy ... I was breastfeeding for four years, which is meant to be protective against breast cancer. If you look at all the risk factors, I tick none of them, if you look at all the preventive things to do, I tick all of them,’’ she said.
‘‘I think [doctors] put those things together and decided I didn’t need to worry.’’
Callaghan, who is mum of 4-year-old Olivia and 2-year-old Ed, felt a lump in her left breast in June. ‘‘I thought it would just be lumpy breasts from breastfeeding,’’ she said.
She went to the doctor, who said the lump was nothing to worry about and to just keep an eye on it.
Callaghan said she didn’t feel comfortable with that so she went to another GP for a second opinion. He also said it was probably nothing to worry about, but did refer her to Dunedin Hospital for an ultrasound.
After an initial examination, a Dunedin Hospital breast surgeon told Callaghan he also thought it was unlikely to be cancer. ‘‘And then we did an ultrasound, we did a mammogram and we did a biopsy and four hours after initially talking to him, he said ‘I’d be 90 per cent sure that this is cancer’.’’
A few days later, on November 7, the biopsy results confirmed the breast cancer diagnosis. Callaghan was booked in for mastectomy, chemotherapy and radiation. However, a CT scan last Monday showed the cancer had spread to her lymph nodes and liver so she was no longer eligible for treatment, only palliative care.
Instead of waiting to die, Callaghan is raising funds for alternative treatment at the Hope4Cancer healing centre in Mexico.
She hopes to leave for the Mexico clinic in the next few weeks for her first treatment.