Triple Negative Breast Cancer, "I Won't Back Down!": Oakland A's Breast Cancer Awareness Game 2015 With My TNBC Sisters in California...

What is TNBC

WHAT IS TRIPLE NEGATIVE BREAST CANCER?

Just in recent years, Triple Negative Breast Cancer (TNBC) has sparked interest in the news where instead of calling the tumor as ER-negative, PR-negative, and HER2-negative; researchers began using the shorthand term, "Triple Negative," dubbed the "new type" of breast cancer. Being Triple Negative, you don't have a targeted therapy and your only treatment option is chemotherapy.

Triple Negative Breast Cancer is seen in about 15% of all breast cancers. TNBC is a very aggressive cancer that tends to strike younger women, pre-menopause, especially among African-American women and women who have BRCA1 mutations. The tumor tends to be fast growing and is less likely to show up on an annual mammogram. TNBC is more likely to metastasis early on; has a high rate of recurrence in the first 2-3 years from diagnosis and has a poorer prognosis than other types of breast cancer due to lack of specific, targeted treatment for TNBC.

Thursday, September 10, 2015

Oakland A's Breast Cancer Awareness Game 2015 With My TNBC Sisters in California...

Us TNBC Sisters,
Melissa, Lisa and Maria

About 4 years ago, one of my Triple Negative Breast Cancer sisters had posted photos from a breast cancer awareness baseball game with the Oakland A's that I thought was a fabulous event that they put on at the Oakland Coliseum in Oakland, California. Every year after, I would see photos from the Oakland's A's annual breast cancer awareness game and I wished I was there too to experience all the happenings at the game for survivors. Every year, I would hear, "Mel, you have to come out to California during the breast cancer baseball game." Well, this year on September 6th 2015, a couple of my TNBC California sisters helped me get to the game with surprising me with a survivor game ticket to all of the survivor festivities where I met several other TNBC sisters from our online support group. Maria and I have tailgated before the game in the parking lot with a bottle of champagne celebration. At the game, I had lunch with my TNBC sisters at a survivor luncheon where we took group photos and pics with Oakland A's mascot, Stomper the elephant. All of us survivors wearing our pink A's jerseys and carrying a pink balloon, walked out onto the infield and stood together to form a pink ribbon and be honored for being a fighter of breast cancer. I was in awe of how many survivors were brought together out on the infield, and so many of us were so young. White doves were released as a symbol of hope, as they flew circulating around the top of the stadium. At the end of the national anthem, all of us survivors released our pink balloons to honor the ones that were taken from breast cancer... it was a very emotional moment. Oakland A's has raised $74, 500 that day to benefit The American Cancer Society and the Cancer Prevention Institution of California supporting research, education and free services to cancer patients in the Bay Area.
Thank you Maria and Lisa for a fabulous time and making a dream come true for me.