Hayley Browning is young and in love, living what looks like an incredible life. However three short weeks ago the woman from Essex in the UK discovered she has breast cancer.
Sadly such diagnoses are not all that uncommon, but the way she detected the breast cancer is . And Hayley wants all women to learn from her experience.
She says the only reason she detected her breast cancer was because she performed a self-exam while lying down.
“I’m hoping to share a little trick of mine with as many people as possible, which could potentially help save someone’s life,” she wrote. “Three weeks ago, I was diagnosed with Breast Cancer. I could only feel the lump whilst lying down and it completely disappeared standing up. Most websites tell you to check for lumps in the shower but if I had followed this advice, the lump may have grown too large to be treatable.”
“Not even the surgeon could feel my lump when I was standing up.”
Her post has been shared over 65,000 times and received almost 10,000 comments. Hayley says her Facebook post is “a call out to all women to check for lumps lying down, as well as standing up.”
Hayley’s advice is so important because the earlier any form of cancer is found, the higher the survival rate.
Breast cancer is the most common form of cancer to cause death in woman in Australia, after lung cancer, according to Cancer Council Australia. If the cancer is found early and limited to the breast, 96 per cent of patients will still be with us five years after diagnosis.
Top Comments
Another tip - my 2cm lump is hard to feel lying down or standing up. Even the GP wasn't sure it was there, until a scan showed it was the size of a large grape! But it is very easy to feel in/out of the shower if I use shampoo/soap/moisturiser and run my hand with light pressure over my breast. I am very fortunate that it is benign.
i have a fear of being a hypochondriac - and i feel "lumps" quite often but i am confused by what is a lump and what is just tissue... like if the lump is towards the edge of my breast - am i actually just feeling muscle and bone? i'm so confused. if anyone has any tips on what a lump actually feels like, please tell me!
Please visit your doctor for this sort of advice: they can show you appropriate techniques and help you differentiate between those lumps and bumps. This really isn't the sort of thing you should be looking to strangers on the internet to provide instruction on.