Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 29

29

our-Time
Survivor
n
AS TOLD TO LEXI DWYER

ILLUSTRATIONS BY TINA ZELLMER

Diane Heditsian
is a CEO and
patient advocate
living in the
San Francisco
Bay Area. Here's
how she honed
her resilience
through two
decades of
breast cancers

2002, everything was going
well for me. As CEO, I was
building the company I'd
founded 20 years before.
My kids were 11 and 16, so not in that stage
where they needed constant attention. I was
really enjoying my life.
Then I got the cancer diagnosis. I was 48.
Doctors found three lumps in my right breast
during a routine mammogram. It came out of
the blue. Nobody in my family that I knew of
had breast cancer. It was the shocker of shocks.
I felt assaulted, wondering, where did this
come from? Why me? I struggled for a while,
wanting to know the cause. But we learn as
cancer survivors that's not the best question to
ask at the beginning, because it won't help you
at first. You can look at that later.

The affected area was too big for radiation
therapy-which uses high-energy rays to kill
cancer cells-so my only choice was to get a
mastectomy of my right breast. I had to have
chemotherapy, too.
And because my cancer was estrogen
receptor-positive, I also went on an estrogenblocking medicine for five years. I had a
delayed breast reconstruction a few months
after the mastectomy, and I was very happy
with the results.

Another Cancer

Ten years later, in 2012, doctors found a lump in
my left breast during my annual mammogram.
That was another shock. It was a small tumor.
I was ready to get a mastectomy of my left
breast. But my surgeon, whom I trusted, talked
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Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021

Contents
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - Cover1
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - Cover2
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - Contents
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 2
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 3
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 4
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 5
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 6
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 7
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 8
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 9
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 10
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 11
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 12
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 13
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 14
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 15
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 16
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 17
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 18
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 19
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 20
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 21
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 22
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 23
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 24
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 25
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 26
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 27
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 28
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 29
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 30
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 31
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 32
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 33
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 34
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Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 40
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 41
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 42
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 43
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 44
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Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 54
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Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - 56
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - Cover3
Vim & Vigor - Spring 2021 - Cover4
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