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Search forImpressed patient helps out at hospice
Friday, November 21, 2008, 09:00
Susan Miller (58), of Fairway, Waltham, has received treatment at the hospice after contracting lymphoedema – a swelling of the arm caused by breast cancer surgery she had when she was 30.
She said: "Because it was so long ago when I first got breast cancer, doctors didn't tell me I had it.
"I had an operation to remove lumps in my lymph glands and then they told me I had breast cancer because they found another tumour in my breast.
"When they carried out my mastectomy I got the lymphodema and I have had it ever since.
"My children, Mark and Julie, were three and five at the time of my operation so I didn't consider my feelings, I just got on with it for their sakes."
Susan's arm – which once measured 22 inches in circumference – has to be bandaged twice a year by hospice staff to compress the swelling.
She said: "There are quite a few people at the hospice who suffer from the condition.
"I do sometimes worry that I will frighten patients in the early stages of breast cancer treatment because I have the biggest lymphoedema I have ever seen."
Susan – who says her condition affects her ability to buy clothes – suffered a set-back in 2006 when a prosthetic breast implant she had inserted in 1987, became infected.
She said: "I was at my lowest point then, I became very depressed but I picked myself up.
"I now come in every fortnight to have the lymphoedema swelling, which spreads into my back, massaged.
"I have been using the hospice for 12 years and I've been coming in to do volunteering for more than two years.
"I help sort through the donations and I have made many friends."
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