In December 2021, I was diagnosed with invasive lobular breast cancer. (ILC). I had never heard of it; I thought all breast cancers were the same. 10-15% of breast cancers are lobular; it is the second most common type. However, lobular behaves very differently to other types of breast cancer and outcomes tend to be poorer. In its early stages, it does not form lumps, but spreads through the breast tissue like a spider’s web. So it is difficult to feel and can be missed on mammograms.

Therefore, people who have lobular breast cancer are often diagnosed at a later stage. As I was. By the time I felt my cancer, I was Stage 3 – it had spread to quite a lot of the lymph nodes in my armpit and was therefore more likely to have spread to other parts of my body. No evidence was found of this, but I had to have aggressive treatment – surgeries, chemotherapy, radiotherapy and I have just finished 2 years of a targeted therapy. I will be on hormone blockers for 10 years.

Yet after all this treatment, my breast cancer could still come back. Lobular can recur even after 10 years. And lobular spreads to more uncommon areas, such as the digestive tract and the peritoneum. Because of the sneaky way lobular grows, this spread is hard to feel and detect. I would love there to be a specific treatment available to target the unique way that lobular grows, so that anyone facing this diagnosis knows there is a treatment solution to target it. That could be me again, of course, if my cancer comes back. At the moment, there is no specific treatment for lobular breast cancer. It is treated the same as the more common ductal, even though they behave in different ways.

Dr. Susan Michaelis launched the 'Lobular Moon Shot Project' in May 2023. The project seeks to raise £20,000,000 for a 5 year research project into ILC by the Manchester Breast Centre. Work has already started, using the money we have raised over the last 2 years.

On Saturday May 24th, I plan to walk 22 km from St Cross Hospital in Rugby to the Red Lion pub in Hunningham. This is for the 22 women a day in the UK (1000 women a day worldwide) who are diagnosed with lobular.

Thank you for supporting me to raise finds to try to find specific treatments for my cancer.