08-08-2025
New mum shrugged off this common complaint... but it was a sign of deadly breast cancer
A mother-of-four has told of her devastating cancer diagnosis after doctors initially dismissed a key symptom.
Andrea Henderson, 41, from Northumberland, first went to her GP after experiencing a sharp stabbing pain in her chest and suffering from extreme fatigue.
But, given her busy lifestyle juggling looking after her four children and her photography career, her doctor assured her it was nothing to worry about.
Chest pain can develop for a number of reasons and is often caused by something harmless like indigestion or heartburn, according to the NHS.
But when she noticed her nipple was bleeding after showering one morning in February, alarm bells began to ring.
Ms Henderson contacted her GP surgery straight away and booked in for a same-day appointment, voicing her cancer concerns.
'It was a spontaneous bleed and right away, I called my GP for a same-day appointment,' she recalled.
Ms Henderson's GP examined her breasts and discovered a tiny lump underneath her left nipple, which was around the size of a grain of rice.
A lump, and nipple discharge which may have blood in it, are common symptoms of breast cancer.
'They were very good after that', the mother-of-four added.
'I was seen straight away and referred to the cancer clinic.'
Scans and a biopsy later revealed that she had HER2 positive breast cancer—an aggressive form of the disease accounting for around 15 in every 100 cases.
Ms Henderson said she felt 'horrible' hearing those words after her symptoms had been brushed off for over a year.
'The consultant had even said to me: "Oh, I don't think this looks like cancer, I've seen it in lots of women"', she recalled.
She then had an MRI on chest to check if the cancer had spread to nearby lymph nodes, where it would be harder to treat.
The scan revealed a 4.9cm tumour in her chest which contained some aggressive cancer cells.
Just two months later the mother-of-four underwent a mastectomy to remove the tumour followed by reconstructive surgery to make a new breast on 4 June.
'It was terrifying,' she said. 'Knowing how much life was going to change—I felt horrible.
'Especially losing a breast—you have to really find out that beauty is soul-deep and nothing to do with how you look.'
She was also told that she would need 10 years of hormone therapy to lower the amount of estrogen in her body and block its effects to lower the risk of the cancer returning.
Also known as endocrine therapy, this treatment will trigger early menopause, leaving her infertile.
Reflecting on her diagnosis, Ms Henderson said: 'Cancer really strips you back to the bare minimum, and I think it's making me a lot stronger than I already was.'
Yesterday Ms Henderson started the first of eight gruelling rounds of chemotherapy which will take her through to December.
Together with her family she has launched a GoFundMe to enable her to take time away from work and focus on her treatment.
She is now urging young women to check their breasts regularly and calling on officials to lower the age of breast cancer screenings on the NHS.
'Younger women always have a worse prognosis because we have a lot more estrogen,' she explained.
'We need to start having routine mammograms for younger women too because a lot of things can get missed,' she added.
'While checking your breasts it is so important not to miss your nipples out—just because they're naturally bumpier doesn't mean they're immune.
'Check under your arms too', she added. 'look out for any dimpling or swelling, as well as inverting in the nipple and general changes in the breast.
Her warning comes as millions of women in England could soon be offered breast cancer checks as young as thiry on the NHS.
Currently, al women aged between 50 and 70 are invited for screening every three years, with the first invitation arriving between the age of 50 and 53.
But every year, more than 10,000 women who are deemed too young to be offered a check are diagnosed with the disease, with 2,000 deaths among those below the age of 50.
Now a groundbreaking new trial has found almost one in five women screened in their thirties have an increased risk of developing breast cancer.
Experts, led by Dr Sacha Howell from the world-renowned Chritis hospital in Manchester, are now calling for all women to be offered a 'comprehensive risk assessment' at the age of 30.
One in seven women in the UK are diagnosed with breast cancer in their lifetime making it the most common cancer in the UK.
Around 85 per cent of women diagnosed with breast cancer survive more than five years.
Figures show that currently a third of women asked for screening do not attend. That rises to almost half of women who are invited for the first time.
