Survivor’s mission
Turns agony into advocacy after KOing breast cancer
A young New York woman who was diagnosed with an aggressive form of breast cancer — despite no history of the disease in her family — is now on a mission to turn her agony into advocacy.
Roshni Kamta was months away from her 23rd birthday last year when she first felt a lump in her left breast.
“Because of my age I didn’t really think anything of it,” Kamta, a media planner in Manhattan, told the Daily News. “In my head I just thought it was breast tissue.”
Then in April 2019, she started bleeding from her nipples, prompting a trip to the nearest obstetrician-gynecologist she could find.
After a sonogram and a biopsy, Kamta received a devastating diagnosis — she had triple negative breast cancer, a rare form of the disease that affects only about 10% of breast cancer patients.
“When I talk about it, I feel like I’m telling someone else’s story,” Kamta said as she held back tears. “It feels like an out-of-body experience. It doesn’t feel real.”
The Rutgers University graduate is now on the path to recovery, after five months of chemotherapy and surgery. But the journey wasn’t an easy one, in part because Kamta had few women her age to lean on for support.
“No one in my friend group ever had cancer, so it’s weird being at that age where you’re supposed to go out and have fun but you can’t because your immune system is compromised,” she said.
The lack of a network of young breast cancer survivors inspired Kamta to create her own and become more vocal on social media about her experience.
“Cancer isn’t all smiles and mantras,” she wrote on Instagram in October. “Cancer is sh—-y. I see a therapist weekly to talk about how I am feeling and there I am learning it is OKAY and NORMAL to feel this way.”
“When you’re younger you feel like you can do whatever you want,” Kamta said. “Now I’m more aware of what’s normal in our bodies and what isn’t.”
Kamta’s doctors at the Dubin Breast Center at the Tisch Cancer Institute of Mount Sinai Hospital say her case is an anomaly, given her age and the lack of DNA markers to suggest that she may be susceptible to breast cancer.
It goes to show how vital it is for women of all ages to get tested, said Dr. Elisa Port, director of the Dubin Breast Center and chief of breast surgery at Mount Sinai.
“The average woman isn’t even recommended to have a mammogram until age 40,” said Port, who performed Kamta’s lumpectomy. “So women in their 20s and 30s, unless they have a family history, are typically not getting screened.”
Getting breast cancer at a young age also forces women like Kamta to make decisions they wouldn’t consider until later in life — like freezing their eggs before chemotherapy.
“How do we help her think about fertility?” said Kamta’s medical oncologist, Dr. Hanna Irie. “She will always have to be vigilant about recurrence and learn how to deal with that anxiety.”
The hair Kamta lost during chemo is starting to grow back, a sign of a bright future.
But she is getting regular radiation treatment now to prevent any possible recurrence. She knows nothing can be taken for granted.
“I urge my friends now to check themselves every month, check your period, your boobs,” Kamta said. “You’re the only one who knows your body.”