Why I’m Telling You to Get Your Mammogram: My Own DCIS Story

October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month, and this year I’m not writing this post from the sidelines.  Last August, I was diagnosed with DCIS — Stage 0 Breast Cancer — found during a routine mammogram. I had a lumpectomy. I went through radiation. And I am telling you all of this today because it might be the single most useful thing I write this month.

Here’s what I want you to sit with: Stage 0 means they caught it before it had the chance to become something harder to treat. That’s not luck. That’s what a mammogram is actually for. It’s not a formality you check off once a year. It’s the thing that can catch a problem back when it’s still small, still quiet, still manageable — before it ever gets the chance to become a crisis.

I’m not going to pretend the process was fun. Nobody enjoys a mammogram, and nobody enjoys hearing the word “cancer” attached to their own name, even with “stage 0” sitting right in front of it. But I’ll tell you what was worse than any of that: thinking about what it would have looked like if I’d put it off. If I’d told myself I was too busy, or it could wait until next year, or I felt fine so what was the point.

This is also exactly why I’m not stopping at mammograms in this post. Colonoscopies deserve the same straight talk. Nobody wants to schedule one. Everybody has a joke ready about the prep. And still — colon cancer is one of the most preventable cancers there is, specifically because a colonoscopy can catch and remove precancerous polyps before they ever turn into something dangerous. The screening isn’t just early detection. It can be actual prevention.

I know this crowd. I know how easy it is to put your own appointments at the bottom of the list under the kids, the grandkids, the job, the house, everyone else’s needs. I did it too, right up until a routine mammogram changed that math for me permanently.

So here’s what I’m asking, not suggesting — asking. If you are behind on your mammogram, call today and get it on the calendar. If you’re 45 or older and haven’t had a colonoscopy, or you’re overdue for your next one, make that call too. Not next month. Today, while this post is still open on your screen.

I share this not for sympathy, but because one mammogram changed the entire trajectory of my year and I want that for you too, except I want yours to be the appointment that gives you total peace of mind rather than a diagnosis.