Both Sides, My Choice: Double Mastectomy Decision Stories

Inside this volume

Fifty first-person accounts describe deciding whether to have a double mastectomy after a breast cancer diagnosis or a gene result. Some chose both sides because of a BRCA1 change, breasts that were hard to scan, a third scare, or a mammogram they could no longer face; others kept one breast, or had a lumpectomy after a surgeon said no. The writers include a school bus driver, a midwife, a hairdresser, a pharmacist, a family doctor, a landscape gardener, a lawyer with a spreadsheet, two men with breast cancer, a husband beside his wife and a seventy-four-year-old whose daughter wanted more surgery than she did, from Lagos and Pune to Belfast and northern Ontario. Distance, money, insurance and access to imaging shaped several choices. They describe gene tests for sisters and cousins, surgeons who disagreed, asking for a woman surgeon or an interpreter, going flat, implants, an eleven-hour reconstruction, reconstruction delayed fourteen months, nipple-sparing surgery that was not an option, and a misunderstanding about radiation. The outcomes are mixed: one hairdresser is not sure she would do it again, one reconstruction failed and left her flat, and cancer came back in one woman's other breast years later. Many describe grief and relief arriving on the same day.

Who it's for

For anyone sitting in that small room weighing one side or both, living with the choice afterwards, or standing beside a wife, mother, sister or friend who is deciding.

Format · Instant download · PDF & EPUB · Fifty first-person accounts · PDF: 233 pages

A collection of personal testimony, offered as companion reading — not medical advice.

• 50 single-author testimonies from real people
• A short, plain-language introduction to the topic
• Editor's note, contents page, and curated resource list
• Professional interior typesetting and an original cover

Every purchase includes a print-quality PDF (best for desktop, tablet, and printing) and a reflowable EPUB (best for Kindle, Apple Books, Kobo, and phones). Files are DRM-free. You can download both instantly from the order-confirmation screen, and we email them to your inbox as well, so your books are always within reach.