Ms Denise Charity Atwine, who has been battling breast cancer since 2018, addresses cancer survivors in Kamwokya, Kampala, on October 4, 2024. PHOTO | BEATRICE NAKIBUUKA
Ms Denise Charity Atwine, a resident of Mende Sub-county in Wakiso District, did a self-breast check in 2018 and found a lump in her right breast.
The lump was the size of a pea.
She told her friend who had lost a mother due to breast cancer about the lump. Her friend recommended a doctor and even picked her from her home and took her to Mulago hospital to meet the doctor.
Upon examination and several tests at the Uganda Cancer Institute (UCI), she was diagnosed with breast cancer but she thought she should get another opinion.
“I got the second and third opinion from different places but one of them was negative. I was in denial so I went back to UCI to do the fourth test and the pathologist refused to do it. He told me to follow my heart. I just went home and I did not tell anyone,” Ms Atwine said.
For two years, she lived in a state of confusion and would silently ask people what a person with cancer would do without disclosing to them that she was the one. The responses were more confusing and unbelievable to her. She prayed and fasted believing that God would heal her but she still needed to take her treatment.
Ms Atwine treated her diagnosis as if it was negative.
She conceived and gave birth in November 2020 but after five months of breastfeeding, she contracted the Covid-19 virus, so she weaned her baby to prevent it from catching the virus.
During the isolation period, Ms Atwine realised that her right breast looked bigger, was heavier and did not have milk. Its colour had also changed. She took a picture of the breast and sent it to her friend and upon doing a google search, the picture matched those that were said to be cancerous.
“I also had swollen lymph nodes in the armpit. I went to Kiruddu hospital where I did a CT scan that showed that there was cancer [cancerous cells] but fortunately, it had not spread to other parts of the body. I still did not disclose it to anybody except one of my brothers. Since the doctor said I was going to be an outpatient I did not feel it would be such a bad time,” she explained.
Her doctor had explained that she needed to stay hydrated and eat well once she started treatment or she would have severe side effects. Ms Atwine thought it would be easy. She then walked into the cancer institute for her first cycle of chemotherapy and went home.
The reality of the treatment
Three days after the dose, life became hard. She lost her appetite, got diarrhoea, vomited and felt weak. The next day, her husband was out for work and she was home with her baby and a maid.
Ms Atwine said: “I told the maid to keep checking on me and she faithfully did. When I went to use the washroom, I collapsed and passed out. She came to check on me and went out to call neighbours that I was dead. I could hear her but was too weak to respond or even lift my hand.”
Fortunately, that same day, her friends had come to pray with her and when they checked around the bedroom, they found some of her medical records so they rushed her to a clinic.
Since she was severely dehydrated, she stayed unconscious for nearly eight hours. When she regained consciousness after a number of drips and medication from the nearby clinic, she was referred to Mulago hospital where her doctor reminded her that she had to drink about five litres of fluids every day. The doctor also gave her medicine that would boost her appetite.
Ms Atwine said: “The second dose was not as bad as the first one. My body got used to the medicine. After the fourth dose, I had to undergo surgery to remove the breast and thereafter continue with another four cycles of chemotherapy after healing of the wound.”
“I was not the same after the surgery. I got depressed. My body had changed. I tried to balance the breasts by stacking pieces of clothes but they did not balance and would fall out. My husband was no longer intimate the way he used to,” she added.
A number of women who suffer from cancer, no matter the type, face domestic indifference from their spouses, especially when they lose some parts of their body that identifies their gender.
Many women do not go with their husbands to get the cancer treatment and counselling and while they may be able to understand the decisions made by the doctor to remove some body parts, their spouses do not.
Ms Atwine resorted to locking herself in her house and did not want to talk to anyone. She did not know where her husband was since he gave excuses to be away from home all the time.
Finding strength in community
Fortune smiled upon her when her area chairperson connected her with the Uganda Women Cancer Support Organisation (UWOCASO).
“They sent me two people to speak to but I refused to even open the door. The third one disguised that she needed something so she randomly found me outside the house and later disclosed that she had purposed to see me. She then came back with a group of women but I still just stared at them as tears rolled down my face because I thought they did not understand my situation,” Ms Atwine said.
When the group left, one of the women stayed and opened up to her about domestic matters. She also invited her to their workshops and when she got there, she felt a bit of relief after hearing from other women who faced similar to worse experiences.
“I looked forward to joining them again. I had stopped taking my radiotherapy, so they encouraged me to go and complete my treatment. I was made to lead a group of women and I shared with them the skills that I knew and also learnt a lot from them,” said Ms Atwine, who completed treatment two years ago.
She said she now goes for follow-up appointments every three months at the cancer institute.
Ms Atwine is hopeful that she will be declared cancer free in the near future.
A beacon of hope
Today, at 44, Ms Atwine is a patient navigator at the cancer institute using her experience to guide new patients through their journeys. She links them to their doctors and pleads that they get a waiver on some services.
Ms Atwine is also in a struggle to rescue her home, which she is about to lose to her husband whom she thinks feels she is now an incomplete woman with one breast compromising her dignity, yet her spirit shines brightly because her story is one of resilience, courage, and the power of community.
In her darkest moments, Ms Atwine discovered that even in pain, connection can spark healing, turning sorrow into a pathway for others.
About breast cancer
Breast cancer is the second commonest cancer, after cervical cancer, in women in Uganda but can be treated and is curable once detected and treated early enough.
Breast cancer starts from the breast or breast cells. It usually starts as one breast cell that abnormally grows into a cancer cell and with time makes a swelling after an accumulation of the cells.
Signs and symptoms
Thickening part of the breast, the skin at the breast that looks like an orange peel, sunken nipple, changes in breast size, bloody discharge, a lump in the armpit or breast, are some of the signs and symptoms of breast cancer.
