No Genetic Link
Breast cancer has become so well understood that even cancer muggles know about the strong possibility of genetic links. In casual conversation about breast cancer one of the first questions people think to ask is whether “it’s genetic” or if “you’re BRCA.”
When you actually get diagnosed with breast cancer you get to meet with a genetic counselor and find out it’s actually not that simple. Of course not. Nothing about cancer is ever simple. There are all kinds of genetic mutations that can lead to cancer. BRCA1, BRCA2, PALB, etc. When you meet with the geneticist they tell you that they’ll test you for the most common ones, about 25 that they know of, and that there are probably many more that they don’t know of.
I enthusiastically signed up for the genetic screening. I have three kids and my genetic information is invaluable for them. If they’ll have some genetic risk of getting breast cancer we all need to know. They’re so young that it’s hard for me to imagine, but I worry about their futures all the time. I also have a sister, and the thought of her going through this sickens me. She’s as tough as they come, but no woman needs to be tested with a tidal wave of hell on Earth to prove the depth of her strength. (I should note that men also get breast cancer, despite the fact that my perspective is that of a female, no one is “safe.” And can you imagine the additional mental hurdle of a man having a cancer so inextricably associated with the color pink and Baby Boomer women?)
Triple negative breast cancer, especially in young women is commonly linked with one of the BRCA mutations. The likelihood of a pregnant woman getting breast cancer is less than three percent, and to be triple negative on top of that is even more rare, and to be triple negative and pregnant without a genetic mutation is rare AF.
I got the results of my genetic screen and that’s apparently what I am. Rare AF. No BRCA mutations, no genetic link, nothing.
This is absolutely wonderful news. I don’t have to worry about passing one of these genes on to my babies. They’re mostly safe. My girls will have to get mammograms starting at ten years younger than I was at the age of my diagnosis, which will mean 27 years old for them. It’s jarring to think about my daughters headed in for cancer screening mammograms when they are younger than I was when I had my first baby (29), but at least we aren’t worried about BRCA for them.
Unfortunately, this leaves me with my rare AF quandary. How the fuck did this happen?
Given my lifelong experience with random bad things happening to me like my anaphylaxis to peanuts at a time when it was almost unheard of, and my intestinal ileus that was so rare the surgeon said he had never seen or operated on one before, I feel like I can accept random bad things happening to me. I’m fine with the search for what caused my cancer ending at “fucking terrible luck.”
But other people are not. I have been in numerous casual conversations about folks with cancer where they discuss how something about the cancer patient’s lifestyle or history must have caused this cancer. It’s a natural defense mechanism. No one wants to be this unlucky, so they try to pinpoint something about the behavior of the cancer patient that sets them apart and makes them different, i.e. making it less likely that bad luck cancer could possibly befall them.
People want to find a REASON that I have cancer. People cannot just accept that the world is random and cruel. Folks have a visceral need to assuage themselves that their lifestyle is so good and pure that something as awful as cancer could not possibly happen to them. They look at the horror and say “that can’t happen to me because I am a good person.”
Guess what? No one is off the hook.
The notion that I have to carry on this damn breast cancer conversation for the rest of my life and can’t give some genetic or other justification for muggles to hang their hats on is a hard pill to swallow. I know, because of my experience in the muggle world, that the minute I walk away, folks will be speculating on what aspect of my life caused my cancer.
“It has to be something” they’ll say. “I heard she ate too much red meat/didn’t do yoga/didn’t go to church/drank too much wine/used lotion with parabens/didn’t douche with kale”/whatever crank pot bullshit conspiracy theory is floating around online on any given day.
Let’s get one thing straight: that shit is disrespectful, infuriating, and some mean cancer shaming bullshit.
It’s bad enough that I will have to live the rest of my life with my mother attempting to reverse engineer my entire existence to Nancy Drew herself to the bogus cause of my cancer.
Anyone who blames me for my cancer is a grade A asshole and not my friend.
Science has not taken humanity to the point of where anyone can determine why I have cancer. If you are so curious to know what is causing cancer, consider funding science. Vote for candidates that fund science. Put your money where your mouth is and leave the cancer patients alone.
I have no genetic link. I don’t know what caused my cancer. Maybe someday, if enough of you decide that science is valuable again, we will have more answers. Until then, it’s the same as the story written all over the pages of my medical history, bad fucking luck.
