Lately, we encountered many breast cancer cases. Indeed pathetic. By sharing this story with you, we hope that those who come after this unfortunate patient, can learn and understand the “folly” of taking the wrong path.

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Ani (not real name) is a 31-year-old Indonesia lady. In December 2013, Ani was breast feeding her baby. Her breast swelled. A month later, she felt a lump in her left breast. In April 2014, Ani felt her whole body was uncomfortable. She went to consult a doctor. An ultrasound done did not show anything wrong with her breast.

Ani went back to see her doctor again in May 2014. The lump in her left breast was removed. Unfortunately, this time it was said to be cancerous — infiltrating ductal carcinoma, Grade 3 with microvascular invasion. Ani was asked to have a mastectomy — i.e., removing  the whole breast. She refused. She was also asked to undergo chemotherapy. She also refused.

Ani turned to folk medicines, taking teas made from soursop leaf, kunyit putih, and bawang dayak (also known as bawang tiwai).

Ani started to take bawang dayak from April 2015 until early 2016.  She believed that bawang dayak helped her in spite of the fact that in September 2015 many small lumps appeared in her left breast. These lumps then grown bigger and coalesce into a single big lump.

Ani underwent a second surgery to remove the lump together with a large portion of her breast tissue. Histopathology report dated 4 November 2014, indicated that her breast tumour as negative for estrogen receptor, negative for progesterone receptor and negative for Her2 receptor.

Ani was asked to undergo chemotherapy. Again she refused and continued with her bawang dayak.

Her recipe: She would boil 7 bawang (like onion bulb) and take the tea 3 times a day. One kg of bawang dayak cost IDR 200,000  (about RM 60.00).

Things did not work out well for Ani. In January 2016, CT showed the cancer had spread to her lungs. She was referred to an oncologist who asked her to undergo chemotherapy. Again she refused.

In May 2016, Ani and her husband came to seek our advice. She presented with hot, pulling pains in her left breast. The pain lasted the whole day and night.  She had difficulty sleeping due to the pains. Indeed, as in the picture below, her whole left breast was badly affected by the cancer.

What Do We Do Now?

You may wish to read a similar story — Lucy and her misadventure with bawang tiwai (https://cancercaremalaysia.com/2016/05/08/bawang-tiwai-did-not-cure-her-breast-cancer-a-big-mistake/).

In Lucy’s case as well as this case, we believe it is better to remove the cancerous breast entirely.  Looking at Ani’s breast, unfortunately, the cancer had already spread extensively. No surgeon would want to cut off the breast without first undergoing chemotherapy. The reasoning is …hopefully chemo would shrink the tumour so that surgery can be performed.

Unfortunately again, Ani had a triple negative tumour — a more difficult type of cancer to treat. It tends to be more aggressive than other type of breast cancer.  About 15 to 20 % of breast cancer is the triple negative type. It occurs more commonly in women under the age of 40.

Lesson We Can Learn From This Case

No matter which angle you look at it, if you have a cancerous lump in your breast, it would not go away! From our 20 plus years of observation, the best solution is to have it removed right away after you are told that you have cancer. Why keep that cancerous breast? If you still insist on keeping this cancerous lump in there, know that it will come back to haunt you one day in the future — a dreadful nightmare indeed!

At the beginning, after a lumpectomy confirmed it was a cancer, Ani did not want to undergo a mastectomy. Our advice again: it is better to lose one breast than to lose your life. And along the way, you also have to suffer!

Know also that when the lump is small, it is easier to remove it totally. But when it has grown big and has spread all over the breast, mastectomy is difficult to perform. Even if you agree to the mastectomy at that stage, the chances of removing all of the cancer is very slim indeed. Even worse, you cannot perform the surgery without first undergoing chemotherapy. From the very beginning Ani did not want chemo. Understandable. But when the cancer had gone out of control, she must, whether she likes it or not, submit to chemo.  So, Ani is back to square one.

Seek Reliable Knowledge 

If you are diagnosed with cancer. Our advice is don’t panic and don’t despair. There is still life if you make the right choice. Yes, the key is the right choice.

To know how to make the choice that is right for you, you need to read …. read and read. Nothing comes easy. So take time to be well informed. There are enough information in the internet to help you. But remember that what is written in the internet may just be unsubstantiated “garbage”, fake testimonials, manipulated results, etc. So be careful.

Before you believe anything picked from the internet, please check and recheck your facts. In spite of this hazard, we still feel the internet is the start of your search for knowledge.

Your Ultimate Choice: Devil vs Deep Blue Sea 

After surgery, you have to make an important decision of your life.

The doctor would want you to go for chemotherapy, radiotherapy and hormonal therapy (or any combination of these). That is the standard “medically right” way to go. But you need not follow your doctor’s advice if your heart tells you to take a different path. In another posting, we wrote about how patients who took this route ended up in an equally messy and dangerous situations.

To-day, in the internet, are numerous alternative therapies which claim to be able to “cure” cancer without having to undergo the aggressive, dilapidating medical treatments above. But in this article, you learn about the fallacy of following this alternative route. This does not mean that other alternative therapies are useless. It is up to you to evaluate these therapies and decide what you are comfortable with.

Over the years, we have helped numerous patients heal their cancer — of course not all who came were successful. Many failed miserably too.

We understand many cancer patients are caught in a limbo. They are not accustomed to be in a situation where they have to make a decision for themselves. If possible, they prefer to have others or the experts, to tell them exactly what to do. They just want to follow — swallow hook, line, and sinker. 

Reflect on these quotations below and know that when it comes to cancer, there is no such thing as a right or wrong choice. It has to be your choice. Follow what your heart says!