When Alicia Clausen found a lump in her left breast while showering four months ago, she knew it couldn’t be good.
She waited a week to tell her husband, Pete, who insisted she see a doctor. Alicia’s primary care provider immediately sent the Vancouver woman to a specialist. A mammogram, ultrasound and biopsy confirmed her fears.
“It was breast cancer,” she said.
Alicia and Pete have been married 15 years — together 20 years. They hoped to start a family this fall. Those plans were put on hold as they faced months of chemotherapy, radiation and surgeries.
“It’s a speed bump,” Alicia said.
Alicia was diagnosed with Stage 2 invasive ductal cell carcinoma on June 12. After discovering the cancer, Alicia underwent an MRI, CT scan and bone scan. The CT scan revealed two large shadows on Alicia’s liver. Her oncologist suspected the breast cancer had metastasized.
“Knowing it’s my own body and it turned on you … it’s unnerving,” Alicia said.
A liver biopsy, however, revealed the shadows were just clusters of cells, not cancer. Alicia’s double mastectomy was scheduled, but the date was set for more than a month away, on Sept. 2, which was Alicia’s 37th birthday.
Frustrated by the lack of progress and communication from her provider, Alicia and Pete found a new oncologist.
Alicia feared the cancer would spread into her bones or liver while she waited for surgery. Pete grew frustrated by the lack of urgency and frequently called Alicia’s providers, urging them to take action sooner.
Alicia’s surgery was rescheduled to Aug. 21. She had two large tumors next to each other in her left breast, near her armpit. Alicia opted for a double mastectomy. The plan was to remove the breast tissue but spare the nipples, place expanders for reconstruction and remove a couple of lymph nodes to test.
After healing from surgery, Alicia was scheduled for eight weeks of chemotherapy, followed by another 12 weeks on another chemotherapy drug. She wouldn’t need radiation, which was a huge relief to Alicia, who has a family history of heart disease.
But, like the Clausens’ plan to start a family, the medical plan hit speed bumps.
Surgeons removed the breast tissue and placed the expanders, but they weren’t able to spare the left nipple. In addition, the surgeons suspected the cancer had reached some of Alicia’s lymph nodes, so they removed 23 nodes.
Four of the lymph nodes came back positive for cancer. That meant Alicia’s breast cancer wasn’t Stage 2, it was Stage 3, and she needed radiation.
“I can’t help but wonder if waiting over 70 days (for surgery) made a difference,” Pete said.
Despite the higher staging, the Clausens got the OK to undergo a round of fertility treatment and egg harvesting. Two weeks after her surgery, Alicia began hormone therapy. She injected herself twice a day for two weeks. Then, on Sept. 15, Alicia had 17 eggs harvested, 11 of which were fertilized.
They hope, down the road, to use a surrogate to start a family.
Alicia returned to her job as an accountant at David Evans and Associates in Portland a couple of weeks after her surgery. Pete left his job at Frito-Lay a year ago to go back to school. He learned his wife had cancer during finals week at Clark College.
While Alicia has medical coverage through her employer, she and Pete had opted for the high-deductible plan this year. Their deductible is $8,000, and the fertility treatment — which can cost more than $20,000 — is not covered. The Clausens applied for a grant through the Livestrong Foundation that would reduce the cost of the fertility treatment by about 30 percent and launched a GoFundMe account, www.gofundme.com/AliciasArmy, to help them pay for other expenses.
Alicia began chemotherapy treatment Sept. 25. She’ll undergo 16 weeks of chemotherapy before beginning radiation. Sometime next year, when she’s completed treatment and her body has healed, Alicia will undergo another surgery to have the expanders in her chest replaced with breast implants.
“We never thought this is how our life would go, but here we are,” Pete said. “It’s amazing how you can be thrown for a loop like this, and while it’s a huge shock, you just pick yourselves up and move forward. We have no option other than fighting as hard as we can.”
