Women everywhere know that lumps in their breasts can be a sign of cancer.
But very few are as familiar with the other symptoms that can also be red flags.
Mothers Emily Nunn, 40, from Rotherham, South Yorkshire, and Katherine Vesey, 42, from the Wirral, Merseyside, are among the 34 per cent of breast cancer patients who are diagnosed after finding a symptom other than a lump.
Mother-of-two Emily experienced discharge from her nipples but it was not until she found a lump a couple of months later that doctors knew the cause.
Meanwhile teacher Katherine first went to the doctors after feeling bruising on her ribs and finding what appeared to be a ‘long, narrow cord’ beneath the surface of her skin.
The women bravely shared their stories with FEMAIL in remarkably candid interviews in the hope of raising awareness of these lesser-known symptoms.
Nipple discharge
Unusual symptom: Emily Lunn experienced a nipple discharged months before finding a lump
Mother-of-two Emily Lunn lives in Rotherham with her husband Greg and their two sons, Billy, nine, and seven-year-old Jamie. She was diagnosed with breast cancer in October last year, while in the first year of studying for a university degree.
Emily first noticed a ‘thick, milky’ discharge coming from her nipple in June 2016.
‘I had no idea what it was, I just knew it was clearly not normal,’ she told FEMAIL. ‘My GP checked it out but told me it was nothing – it disappeared after a week.’
A couple of months later Emily found a lump but didn’t link it to the discharge.
Protective: Emily waited before telling sons Billy, nine, and Jamie, seven about her diagnosis
She said: ‘I waited because I really thought it would be nothing. Now I wish I pursued my worries [earlier]… being told I have stage 3 breast cancer was like being hit by a train. I was reeling for weeks before it finally sank in.’
Emily told how she dreaded telling her husband, Greg, because he had lost his own mother to breast cancer. ‘How could I tell him the love of his life has the same disease?,’ she said.
Not wanting to burden their young sons, the couple waited before telling them about their mother’s diagnosis.
‘It was just before Christmas and, as we were decorating the tree, I told them in simple terms, leaving them to ask questions,’ Emily said. ‘Every day we would set aside time to talk about it – I involved them in everything that was happening.’
Treatment was gruelling and involved a lumpectomy, chemotherapy and radiotherapy.
Recovery: Emily is joined by her sons as she rings a bell to signal the end of her treatment
Emily added: ‘Being breast aware is so important to me now. I’m constantly checking myself and looking for changes, anything unusual at all as I know so many things can mean breast cancer.’
The mother-of-two is now taking an extra year to complete her studies and said she feels ‘stronger than ever’.
She added: ‘I am a bit more seize the day than I was, I just feel really positive about things. Yes, it was bad news at the beginning. But I am very much a person who focuses on the positive and that got me through the treatment and it’s helping me move on.’
Mondor’s disease
Support: Katherine Vesey with her daughters Nicole, 11, and eight-year-old Leila
Teacher Katherine Vesey lives in the Wirral with her husband Michael and their four children, Will, 16, Nicole, 11, and eight-year-old twins Leila and Luca.
The first sign Katherine had that something was wrong was when she felt a bruised rib. She then noticed ‘what felt like a piece of string’ just beneath her skin.
The ‘string’ turned out to be Mondor’s disease, a rare condition caused by inflammation of a vein just under the skin of the breast or chest wall.
It is usually caused by injury or exercise and, as someone with an active lifestyle, Katherine assumed this would be the case. ‘I thought “it’s obviously just that”… I felt quite happy and relieved.’
Active: Katherine initially thought her Mondor’s disease was caused by her active lifestyle
However in rare instances Mondor’s disease can also be a symptom of breast cancer. Katherine returned for an ultrasound on her 42nd birthday and doctors discovered two lumps in the breast.
‘The two lumps were very dense. I could just see two dense lumps staring back at me. The last time I had an ultrasound was when I was pregnant [with the twins] but rather than seeing two heartbeats it was these two, dense horrible lumps… It was horrendous.’
Treatment: Katherine Vesey
When Katherine was told the lumps were cancerous, she immediately jumped to the worst-case scenario. She said: ‘ All I was looking for was how long have I got left? I just didn’t know anything about it. I was waiting to be given my death sentence.’
After an agonising three-week wait, the mother-of-four was given the news that the cancer hadn’t spread and that it was treatable.
‘My consultant came in and straight away and said “it’s not bad, it’s fine”,’ she said. ‘We came home that night and opened a bottle of Champagne because I just had breast cancer.’
Katherine, who blogged throughout her cancer experience, spoke with poignant candour about what she was like during her treatment.
She said: ‘I was narky to the extreme. The way I thought was I wasn’t going to be anybody’s hero. I was focused on protecting my children.’
Next step: Katherine, pictured today, said she is ‘trying to get back to normal’ after treatment
Katherine finished her radiotherapy treatment in September and said she is ‘trying to get back to normal’.
She added: ‘I feel like I am about 10 years older than I was. There’s an expectation that you’ll just bounce [when you stop treatment]. I just had no feeling of elation at all.’
Katherine will be attending a Breast Cancer Care Moving Forward course to help face life after breast cancer with more confidence.
Find out more about the signs and symptoms of breast cancer, visit www.breastcancercare.org.uk/signssymptoms or call Breast Cancer Care’s Helpline free on 0808 800 6000.