Hi, I’m Katie. I’m many things: a mom, a wife, a professional, a new AMR team member, and I’m also a breast cancer survivor. I’ll be sharing my story here on Another Mother Runner as I get back into a regular running routine and train for a half marathon. I hope you’ll come along. Feel free to ask questions or share your thoughts in the comments section below.

I am now 16 weeks out from my last treatment of Taxotere, Carboplatin, Herceptin, and Perjeta, and 14 weeks out from my bilateral mastectomy and reconstruction. I have to say that I am feeling on top of the world. The side effects from chemo are all but gone, except for a little bit of short term memory loss, but honestly I don’t know it it ever came back after my last baby, #amirite Mamas? My hair is coming back, which is a constant source of entertainment for my three girls. They think it is so funny that I look like a boy. They love to rub my head and we have a lot of side bets about what color it’s eventually going to be — it started out light, then it was jet black, and now it’s getting light again.

The only thing that still lingers in my mind is: will the cancer come back?  

To this day, I still have not been able to go down the Google rabbit hole to really get to the heart of my type of breast cancer (HER2+) or the stats for its risk of reoccurrence. When I was first diagnosed, I immediately went online and became so ridden with anxiety with everything that I read, that I told myself I am just going to listen to my doctors and have faith. I’m not naive. I know that it could rear its ugly head again but I’ve recently made a decision that I am not going to let it consume my life. I’m going to be grateful for this second chance I’ve received and not look back. I’m going to take good care of myself through running (hello, AMR!), diet (thank you, Ellie!), cut back on wine (which is soooo hard after a long day!), and pay more attention to the harmful products that are all around us.

This picture is from a walk we took over the weekend. We went to the cookie store, jumped in puddles of melting snow, and enjoyed another gorgeous day in February. My oldest has been pretty quiet about all of this, so when her sisters ran up ahead of us, I decided to try to talk to her about my breast cancer. I asked her if she was scared when I was sick, and she grabbed my hand, looked at me with her big blue eyes, and said, “Yes.” I held back tears and told her that I was scared too, but now I’m all better, so there is nothing to worry about it.  

And I can honestly say that I finally believe it.  

Want to catch up with Katie’s story? Click here.