breast cancer risk, and more

i recently started reading _fresh_milk_ by fiona giles. wow, what a
cool book! i learned about it here (i think, could have been another
one of the "mommy newsgroups" that i read). thank you to whoever it was
that mentioned it.

anyway, since i am reading this book about breasts and nursing, i
thought i would calculate how many total months i have been nursing. i
nursed my son for 22 months and so far 19 for my daughter. that adds up
to 41 months, or 3 years and 5 months. that is amazing to me. on january
19 i will have spent 3 and a half years of my life nursing. i so
totally did not expect to become a home-birthing, extended nursing,
family bedding, no paid employment kind of mother. on the other hand,
every time i express any surprise about this near my husband, he says it
doesn't surprise him in the least, he always knew i would be like this.
on the third hand, he used to say i shouldn't even consider being a
stay-at-home mother, because i would go out of my mind. i think he's
confusing hindsight with foresight. :-)

i was thinking that if i have a third kid, and that kid nurses for a
couple years, i will have surely lowered my breast cancer risk to
practically nil. won't i? i know i could find the stats in giles' book
on what percentage each birth and each year of nursing lowers my risk,
but i have to start with my original risk to calculate what is left.
does anyone here know how one discerns one's pre-birth risk? they say
it is higher for those who smoke, blah, blah, blah. there must be a way
to calculate an individual's approximate risk. is there a web site
somewhere that could help me do that?

just curious.

--
-- Vicki
Married DH May 21, 1995
Ima shel DS, born 11/16/99; and DD, born 5/19/02.
"Stay-at-home" Ima since October 2002.
An ounce of mother is worth a pound of clergy. -Spanish proverb
I may not currently be pregnant, but I look pregnant, does that count?

unfortunately risk doesn't work like that, you might have low risk, but
having another child won't make it zero risk, my mum had breast cancer at
43, after nursing for 2 years, she was in every low risk category
possible, yet she still got it, the only thing she could be glad about was
that despite the fact seh was only 43, both me and my sister were 18+ and
mainly awat from home, imagine having another child in that situation.

I think the statistic is that if you nurse for 7 years your risk of getting
breast cancer is zero. I don't know of any website where you can calculate
the risk though...
"Vicki S" wrote in message
...
i recently started reading _fresh_milk_ by fiona giles. wow, what a
cool book! i learned about it here (i think, could have been another
one of the "mommy newsgroups" that i read). thank you to whoever it was
that mentioned it.

anyway, since i am reading this book about breasts and nursing, i
thought i would calculate how many total months i have been nursing. i
nursed my son for 22 months and so far 19 for my daughter. that adds up
to 41 months, or 3 years and 5 months. that is amazing to me. on january
19 i will have spent 3 and a half years of my life nursing. i so
totally did not expect to become a home-birthing, extended nursing,
family bedding, no paid employment kind of mother. on the other hand,
every time i express any surprise about this near my husband, he says it
doesn't surprise him in the least, he always knew i would be like this.
on the third hand, he used to say i shouldn't even consider being a
stay-at-home mother, because i would go out of my mind. i think he's
confusing hindsight with foresight. :-)

i was thinking that if i have a third kid, and that kid nurses for a
couple years, i will have surely lowered my breast cancer risk to
practically nil. won't i? i know i could find the stats in giles' book
on what percentage each birth and each year of nursing lowers my risk,
but i have to start with my original risk to calculate what is left.
does anyone here know how one discerns one's pre-birth risk? they say
it is higher for those who smoke, blah, blah, blah. there must be a way
to calculate an individual's approximate risk. is there a web site
somewhere that could help me do that?

just curious.

--
-- Vicki
Married DH May 21, 1995
Ima shel DS, born 11/16/99; and DD, born 5/19/02.
"Stay-at-home" Ima since October 2002.
An ounce of mother is worth a pound of clergy. -Spanish proverb
I may not currently be pregnant, but I look pregnant, does that count?

"CY" wrote,

I think the statistic is that if you nurse for 7 years your risk of getting
breast cancer is zero. I don't know of any website where you can calculate
the risk though...

Woohoo!

With the exception of about eleven months from the time Matthew weaned (fall
2000) until the time Margaret was born (9/01), I have been nursing continuously
since February of 1995. I believe that puts me over the seven year mark.

I would *love* to see a cite for your statistic because I have been unable to
get a baseline mammogram, something my doctors have been pushing since I was 38
or 39 (I'm now 42). Nobody will do it for me until I wean and that's not
likely to be for a good long time.

Of course I'll get one eventually but it would be nice to be able to prove my
gut feeling that I'm at extremely low risk for breast cancer (no family
history, either, and I'm of normal weight).

Mary Ellen
William (8)
Matthew (6)
Margaret (2)

"CY" wrote:
I think the statistic is that if you nurse for 7 years your risk of
getting
breast cancer is zero. I don't know of any website where you can
calculate
the risk though...

That can't possibly be true. There are many risk factors for breast cancer:
genes, diet, exposure to environmental toxins, and exposure to estrogen (to
name a few). Breastfeeding most likely reduces the risk of breast cancer by
reducing your exposure to estrogen, but it does not affect the other risk
factors (genes, toxins, diet, etc.). As the amount of time you breastfeed
increases, at some point the reduction in risk will level off so that
additional years spent breastfeeding have no affect on your risk. Maybe that
point is 7 years--in other words, any time spent breastfeeding after 7 years
does not further reduce your risk--but you can never make your risk zero
(for anything), or even negligible unless you do something about all the
risk factors.

-Joy

There is strong breast cancer and uterine cancer in my family. Mom and gran
had early menopause in early 30's followed by a hysterectomy.
That's why I have breastfed all babes and have had my kids close together,
to be on the safe side.

--
Andrea mom of 5 - latest addition Kamron David 6 months still nursing strong
with 2 teeth!

wrote:

I think the statistic is that if you nurse for 7 years your risk of getting
breast cancer is zero. I don't know of any website where you can calculate
the risk though...

I seriously doubt there is *any* way to reduce the risk to zero.

--Helen

Andrea wrote:

There is strong breast cancer and uterine cancer in my family. Mom and gran
had early menopause in early 30's followed by a hysterectomy.
That's why I have breastfed all babes and have had my kids close together,
to be on the safe side.

How does having the kids close together help with cancer? (Or am I
misreading you?)

--
Sara, whose mom just finished radiation treatment

I did find this site, but there was nothing mentioning breastfeeding on it,
oddly... http://www.halls.md/breast/risk.htm
"Vicki S" wrote in message
...
i recently started reading _fresh_milk_ by fiona giles. wow, what a
cool book! i learned about it here (i think, could have been another
one of the "mommy newsgroups" that i read). thank you to whoever it was
that mentioned it.

anyway, since i am reading this book about breasts and nursing, i
thought i would calculate how many total months i have been nursing. i
nursed my son for 22 months and so far 19 for my daughter. that adds up
to 41 months, or 3 years and 5 months. that is amazing to me. on january
19 i will have spent 3 and a half years of my life nursing. i so
totally did not expect to become a home-birthing, extended nursing,
family bedding, no paid employment kind of mother. on the other hand,
every time i express any surprise about this near my husband, he says it
doesn't surprise him in the least, he always knew i would be like this.
on the third hand, he used to say i shouldn't even consider being a
stay-at-home mother, because i would go out of my mind. i think he's
confusing hindsight with foresight. :-)

i was thinking that if i have a third kid, and that kid nurses for a
couple years, i will have surely lowered my breast cancer risk to
practically nil. won't i? i know i could find the stats in giles' book
on what percentage each birth and each year of nursing lowers my risk,
but i have to start with my original risk to calculate what is left.
does anyone here know how one discerns one's pre-birth risk? they say
it is higher for those who smoke, blah, blah, blah. there must be a way
to calculate an individual's approximate risk. is there a web site
somewhere that could help me do that?

just curious.

--
-- Vicki
Married DH May 21, 1995
Ima shel DS, born 11/16/99; and DD, born 5/19/02.
"Stay-at-home" Ima since October 2002.
An ounce of mother is worth a pound of clergy. -Spanish proverb
I may not currently be pregnant, but I look pregnant, does that count?

Doing som Googling:
http://www.prairienet.org/laleche/detcancer.html
http://www.breastfeeding.com/all_abo...st_cancer.html
http://www.mydr.com.au/default.asp?article=3720
"Vicki S" wrote in message
...
i recently started reading _fresh_milk_ by fiona giles. wow, what a
cool book! i learned about it here (i think, could have been another
one of the "mommy newsgroups" that i read). thank you to whoever it was
that mentioned it.

anyway, since i am reading this book about breasts and nursing, i
thought i would calculate how many total months i have been nursing. i
nursed my son for 22 months and so far 19 for my daughter. that adds up
to 41 months, or 3 years and 5 months. that is amazing to me. on january
19 i will have spent 3 and a half years of my life nursing. i so
totally did not expect to become a home-birthing, extended nursing,
family bedding, no paid employment kind of mother. on the other hand,
every time i express any surprise about this near my husband, he says it
doesn't surprise him in the least, he always knew i would be like this.
on the third hand, he used to say i shouldn't even consider being a
stay-at-home mother, because i would go out of my mind. i think he's
confusing hindsight with foresight. :-)

i was thinking that if i have a third kid, and that kid nurses for a
couple years, i will have surely lowered my breast cancer risk to
practically nil. won't i? i know i could find the stats in giles' book
on what percentage each birth and each year of nursing lowers my risk,
but i have to start with my original risk to calculate what is left.
does anyone here know how one discerns one's pre-birth risk? they say
it is higher for those who smoke, blah, blah, blah. there must be a way
to calculate an individual's approximate risk. is there a web site
somewhere that could help me do that?

just curious.

--
-- Vicki
Married DH May 21, 1995
Ima shel DS, born 11/16/99; and DD, born 5/19/02.
"Stay-at-home" Ima since October 2002.
An ounce of mother is worth a pound of clergy. -Spanish proverb
I may not currently be pregnant, but I look pregnant, does that count?