A few months after losing her mother to breast cancer, Donna resident Diana Garza was diagnosed with stage zero of the disease at age 34 in May 2014.
The registered nurse and single mother of two said it was hard to receive the news of her diagnosis.
“Once [the doctor] told me I had cancer, I know he kept talking to me, but I just don’t remember,” she said. “To me, they never said anything. I decided not to tell my daughters or my dad until I knew a plan because I’m a single parent.”
The first person Garza shared the news with was a friend who had a daughter in the same school as her daughters, Danna and Daphne Baez.
“[My friend’s] daughter told the whole class and [my daughter] Daphne came running off the bus crying and saying, ‘Are you going to die, too?’” Garza said. “So, then I had to talk to them and said, ‘I’m not going to die. We have to pray. We have to keep our faith.’”
She said she decided to never leave her daughters out no matter how hard the decision or the news were.
Danna Baez, an exercise science freshman, was 10 years old when her mom was diagnosed with breast cancer.
Baez was in shock when she got the news.
“The things that were popping in my head was, like, ‘Oh, is my mom going to die as well?’” she said. “I was young, so I didn’t really [know] too much about cancer.”
Baez’s sister, Daphne, was 8 years old when her mom was diagnosed.
She said it was something unexpected for her.
“The first thing that came to me was, like, ‘Are we going to have to attend another funeral? Was I going to grow up without a mom?’”
Garza said she was aware of the importance of self-examination.
“My mammogram was normal and my ultrasound was normal but, because I knew my body, I knew something was wrong and I had to seek the help of four doctors because the first three told me it was nothing,” she said. “It was [not] until the fourth doctor [that] they found the tumor through an MRI. … You have to look [at] yourself in the mirror, not just feel but know the color [and] the size.”
Dr. Vijian Dhevan, an assistant professor in the UTRGV School of Medicine Department of Surgery and vice chairman of Clinical Affairs, said self-examination is important.
“I’m a big proponent of self-breast exams, to know your own body,” Dhevan said. “Once a month, when you are showering, just check yourself. It all starts with the patient just taking a look at their body, touching their body, examining their body. That doesn’t cost any money.”
He said men can develop breast cancer, too.
“People think, ‘Oh, breast cancer is just for women,’” Dhevan said. “That’s not the case. Men can develop breast cancer. The problem with men developing breast cancer is we men think, ‘Oh, no, this breast cancer is a woman’s disease. This is nothing that I feel.’ Then we wait and by the time we actually go seek care, it’s too late.”
He encourages women to start breast cancer screening at age 40.
Garza said she opted for a double mastectomy with a reconstruction in August 2014.
“I went through a process where they left me expanders,” she said. “They are little bags inside your skin and every two weeks they would expand them [and] they would put some water, saline, and then the final procedure was done to get breast implants in December of 2014.”
Because she was diagnosed in time, Garza did not have to go through chemotherapy or radiation.
She said it was hard to lose her breasts.
“I had to be strong,” Garza said. “I said, ‘Look, Mommy is losing her breast but that doesn’t stop me from being a woman. That doesn’t define me [as] a woman. I’m still a woman, but I’m first your mother. So, I have to do this because if I remove my breast it gives me a bigger chance to live.’”
The Renaissance Cancer Foundation in Edinburg helped her financially.
“They are the only association in the [Rio Grande] Valley that the funds go to the patients, so they paid for my hotel for two weeks,” Garza said. “They also paid for my first oncologist visit because I didn’t have insurance.”
She said she was scared her cancer would advance and she would not be able to pay for her treatment.
“I called MD Anderson [Cancer Center in Houston] and I said, ‘How much do you charge?’” Garza said. “They asked me for $34,000 as down payment. … I didn’t have health insurance and I said, ‘Am I gonna die?’ But then I called the Cancer Foundation [and] they guided me [and] sent me to Medicaid for breast cancer.”
On Sept. 30, Garza marked eight years of being cancer-free.
Daphne said it was painful not being able to be with her mother.
“I would want to cuddle with her and be there with her but we couldn’t because even sitting on the couch would hurt her,” Daphne said. “I think what helped me a lot was that I was able to help her. I cleaned her drainage. I charted how much she drained out and everything.”
She remembers the night before her mother’s surgery.
“We basically lived in a hotel for a while and I remember we went to Target the night before her surgery and it’s, like, ‘Well, is this the last [time] that she was going to buy me [something]?’ Because, obviously, there are risks in a surgery.”
Baez encourages the community to raise awareness about breast cancer.
“We can fundraise for more research because a lot of women in America get diagnosed every day,” she said. “I saw [that] every two minutes a woman finds out they have breast cancer. I think to spread awareness, we need to do fundraisers, do more walks. We also have to do more events [to] inform women.”
In observance of Breast Cancer Awareness Month and to promote wellness resources on campus, the University Recreation Center will host a Zumba Dance Party & Wellness Expo from 6 to 7:30 p.m. Oct. 20 on the Edinburg campus. The first 100 attendees will receive a complimentary event T-shirt. The event is open to the public. For more information, email recfitness@utrgv.edu.
