Fleming received support from family and God

I think I knew that it was cancer,” breast cancer survivor Bobbi Fleming said about the diagnosis she received almost 30 years ago. “I think sometimes you just know.”

Around March 1990, Fleming said she felt a lump in her breast before her scheduled mammogram.

She waited until her appointment, where the doctor also ordered an ultrasound. She said an appointment was made with a surgeon almost immediately.

“I went to see the surgeon,” Fleming said. “He said it had metastasized more in just those two weeks (since the ultrasound).”

Fleming had an aggressive form of cancer, which she said was almost a stage four.

When she went in to surgery at Lyster at Fort Rucker, she said she told the doctors to do whatever needed to be done to remove the cancer.

“I said, ‘You do what you have to do, whether it has to be a lumpectomy or a mastectomy,” she said. “Don’t wake me up; just do it.’”

The surgery lasted for almost six hours, during which she had a full mastectomy performed on one of her breasts.

“After they did their surgery, they woke me up and said what they’d done,” she said. “The doctor said he thought they got everything, but they did a lymph node (biopsy).

“When he called, he said the lymph nodes were good. They were all cancer-free.”

Following her surgery, Fleming said her oncologist prescribed her Tamoxifen in place of chemotherapy and radiation treatment. Tamoxifen blocks the actions of estrogen, which some breast cancers require to grow.

“When I went to the oncologist, he said they could do the Tamoxifen,” she said. “I wouldn’t have to have any radiation or chemotherapy. I was one of the lucky ones.”

She took a pill every day for 10 years, though she only needed to take the medication for five.

“Ever since, everything has been good,” she said.

She did not have reconstructive surgery immediately after the cancer was removed. Instead she wore a prosthetic for 10 years.

“I wouldn’t look at it because I heard all these horror stories,” Fleming said. “When I went to be fitted for prostheses, the lady said, ‘That just looks so good.’ I was thinking, ‘How could something like that look good?’

“Finally, I had the nerve to look. I was looking for something that was just grotesque. It was just a scar. I felt much better about it.”

After her first surgery, Fleming said the Reach Out for Recover nurse told her that her husband may not be as receptive to the surgery results.

Her husband, Fleming said, had lost his mother to cancer early in his life.

“My husband, they had told me that since his mother had died of cancer, he may not be as receptive (of my mastectomy),” she said. “So, he was there, but he wasn’t there. Finally, I asked him, ‘Are you okay that I had a mastectomy?’”

She said her husband said he was fine, and she offered to show him the scars of the surgery.

“I said, ‘You never asked.’ He said, ‘I didn’t want to upset you.’ So, when he looked at it, he (had) a complete turnaround from (how) he’d been. I think he was afraid I was going to die like his mother did.”

Though she wore a prosthetic for 10 years, she later had reconstructive surgery. Still, she said, having the mastectomy never made her less of a woman.

“I had the prostheses for about 10 years,” she said. “Then, I went and had the reconstruction surgery done, which I should of had that done at the very beginning.

“So, if someone does have a mastectomy, talk to the doctor about reconstruction. I asked my husband if he wanted me to have that done. He said whatever I wanted to do. It didn’t make me less of a woman. I was just thankful to be alive.”

Fleming credits her family support and her faith in God for helping her make it through her fight with breast cancer.

“I think if I hadn’t had my faith in God and family support, I think I would have caved in,” she said. “I’d wake up in the middle of the night while I was at the hospital, and I’d think, ‘I’m not going to see my grandchildren for a while.’ Then, I’d pull myself out of it because I just felt like it was the devil after me, trying to scare me and trying to pull me down.”

She also said she had a great doctor, oncologist and surgeon to help her throughout her journey.

Though it has been almost 30 years since her battle, she said breast cancer has never left the back of her mind.

“Everything that goes wrong with the body, (I think), ‘Has it grown back?’” she said. “So, it’s always in the back of your mind, at least my mind.”

Before her battle with cancer, Fleming said she had only had an aunt that battled cancer of any kind. After her own battle with breast cancer, she said her daughters had mammograms performed as well.

“The two youngest were very fast about doing their baseline,” she said. “The other daughter, I had to push her, but she finally had a baseline.”

She also said that, along with her family and faith, she joined a support group.

“I would suggest, which helped me a lot, is a support group,” she said. “The things that I was going through, they had gone through already. So that was encouraging. They had the same feelings, so I knew that was all natural or normal.”

Fleming said she would encourage all women who are of age to have their yearly mammograms.

She said she has even encouraged her husband to check his breasts. According to the American Cancer Society, over 2,000 cases of invasive breast cancer are expected to be diagnosed in men in 2017.

“I encourage every woman (to have their mammogram), I don’t care what age they are,” Fleming said. “If they feel something, just don’t wait. The sooner you get in and have it checked, (the better). Not only that, it’s just peace of mind.”