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BRG Survivor Series: Breast cancer survivor says sharing story with others is part of the healing process
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Julie Pickle is a survivor. Nearly a year ago, she was diagnosed with triple negative breast cancer, despite not showing any symptoms.
“No symptoms. I just went in for my annual mammogram and, She gets the results right away, follows it up with an ultrasound, and the mammogram comes out fine. She said it looks great. But when she started doing the ultrasound, and poking, prodding around, that's when she found it. And she goes, oh, that wasn't there last year,” Julie said.
Julie said at first she was in a stage of shock and denial.
"I thought, oh, it's just nothing. It's a cyst or something, but I would have, I never thought it could be cancer. Never. I was telling everybody, oh, I'm 90% sure this is going to be nothing. And if it is, I'll be shocked,” she said.
But Julie turned her denial into motivation, battling through treatment, surgery and a scare in the emergency room.
“After the second treatment, I ended up getting an infection in my port, ended up with a high fever. Had to go to the E.R.," she said.
She attributes her success to the love and support that her family provided during recovery.
“My family was very supportive. We're a very faithful family, on both sides. Just all the love and prayers and cousins that called, some that, you know, reached out. They sent me a chemo gift pack, it has a blanket and drinks and socks and anti-nausea things. It was just really nice to get a lot of support and all the prayers and prayer lists I was on just gave me a lot of confidence going through it all, that it was all going to be fine,” Julie said.
Julie said that she is the first person in her family to be diagnosed with cancer.
“I have a long line of female aunts, cousins and older sister and no cancer. But, you know, even my doctor said, well, sometimes it starts with you,” she said.
Now she uses her story to raise awareness and give others hope.
“Knowing that you can, you know, help someone out there recognize that, there is hope that cancer doesn't have to mean that it's a death diagnosis or that there's so much new treatments out there and that there's a way to get through this. And so I wanted to share my story, because that's also part of the healing journey as well, is that we share our stories. We help others, just like people did when I was first diagnosed. They shared their stories. And, you know, let me ask questions,” she said.
Now a year removed from her diagnosis with breast cancer, Julie is living a happy and healthy life surrounded by the people she loves.
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