Support Tawana's Fight Against Breast Cancer

Hello guys, I’m Tawana Douglas and this is the story of how I was diagnosed with Stage 3 Breast Cancer.

In February 2024, as I got out of the shower, I lotioned my body, and I felt a lump on my left breast. After feeling that lump, it scared me badly, so I proceeded to call my doctor to make a doctor's appointment to see what it was all about. Early March, I had an appointment with my doctor, and she felt the lump also. She examined me and referred me to get a mammogram. On the same day, I went to my mammogram appointment at Emory Cancer Institute, the Winship Institute, and I did my mammogram. They told me my mammogram was done. If they thought it was something there, they would proceed for me to get an ultrasound. Honestly, at this point, I was scared because why would they want me to do an ultrasound if everything was okay? The lady started doing my ultrasound, and she could tell I was nervous, so she started talking to me about random things, and that did calm my nerves a little bit. But after the ultrasound was done, they called the doctor in, and the doctor told me that they wanted to do a biopsy of my breast and under my arms because they felt something under my arms as well. After that, I left, feeling all kinds of emotions. I cried. I was just all over the place with it. I didn’t know what to do. The thing I just prayed about it. I gave it to God, even though that was kind of hard for me to do, but I just had to dig deep into my faith and just know everything was gonna be okay.

Time went on. It had to be a good three weeks, but it felt like a year to me because I was waiting on that phone call from the doctor to let me know what my results were. One morning, I was in my room cleaning up. This is about late March now. I received the phone call, and it was the doctor. He had such a gentle voice. He was like, 'Hey Miss Douglas, this is the doctor.' I don’t remember his name, but he was saying, 'Well, I have your test results back, and it’s a little cancerous, but we’re gonna have to go through with the biopsy.' In July, I did the biopsy on my left breast. They told me that there was a mass on my left breast, and it was about the size of a grape. The biopsy under my arm came back negative. On July 29, I had surgery to remove the mass from my left breast, and they wanted to remove lymph nodes from under my left arm just to make sure nothing is cancerous because the biopsy originally said there was no cancer in the lymph node. After the first surgery, the doctor removed the mass out of the left breast, but the bad news was there were cancerous lymph nodes, and they had to go back in to remove the rest of them because he didn’t want to leave any cancerous lymph nodes in my body. So, two weeks after that first surgery, I had to do another surgery and remove the lymph node, and that was very, very painful. Going in the same spot in a short period of time, but it was successful. They removed all the nodes, and it was only one more cancerous lymph node the second time they went in. After that, I had to heal. I started physical therapy because I couldn’t use my left arm, and I had no feeling in my left arm, so it was all a process. I was healing and waiting to go to chemo.

So all of this stuff was going on mentally, emotionally, and financially. I was a mess. Mentally, it’s a lot just knowing that I have to get myself better, knowing I am not able to work, and I have a lot of financial responsibility. That’s on me. It was just a whole lot. I had no income at all. I still don’t have any income, and I have a lot of hospital bills. I remember one day talking to my daughters and letting them know that I was so lightheaded and weak at work as I was trying to work during my healing process after the surgery and everything, but it’s very hard trying to work, and just mentally and physically, my body just wasn’t all the way there. My body was still healing, and I was putting so much pressure on my body to work how it usually would, but I had to face the fact that I couldn’t do the things I did before my diagnosis. It doesn’t make it better that I have a lot of expenses. Not only has being diagnosed with breast cancer taken a mental toll on me, it’s just been very, very, very hard financially. I’m used to working hard for myself and my family for everything since I was a young girl. I was brought up to be a strong, independent woman, so it was a struggle for me to feel so weak and incapable of taking care of myself. I’ve currently undergone three chemo treatments, and I have 13 sessions left to go. I should be done around late March or early April. I’m trying to stay strong and fight this sickness every day. In between the nausea, loss of taste in my mouth, and weakness, I’m trying to be grateful for every day. I am incredibly grateful for anything that you guys can donate. I know we’re all going through some hard times economically, and it’s tough for all of us right now. Anything you can donate would be most appreciated. God bless you all!

I’m fundraising because I have no income and a lot of hospital bills. I need financial support to get through this tough time.