"I'm a nurse... I never skipped mammography," said breast cancer survivor Lorraine Frazier.
Frazier is sharing many of the things she believes have saved and prolonged her life after breast cancer. As the dean at Columbia University School of Nursing, she has a lot of eager listeners.
It began with how she took action when something in her breast just didn't feel right.
She said she felt a "denseness," a "thickening," back in May of 2022.
"I lost my daughter in January of '22, so when I was diagnosed, I was in a pretty numb place," Frazier said.
Grieving the loss of her adult daughter, who was disabled, Frazier then began her own journey through surgery and treatment.
"I had a double mastectomy and chemotherapy, and another oral chemo for two years, and radiation," she said.
Frazier marked the end of her active treatment, but she still has seven more years on an estrogen blocker, and like so many, now is navigating wellness through the years.
"I changed immediately what I ate," she said. "You could not force me to have a drink. I went on a cruise through Burgundy and didn't have any wine."
For so many breast cancer survivors, a huge part of recovery is getting outside and exercising, even right after surgery. For Frazier, it is still five miles of walking every day.
The end result... she and her husband each lost 30 pounds.
Lastly, she is always mindful of her heart and glucose levels, training her body to be less reactive to stress.
"I don't hurry. You will rarely see me hurry ever," she said.
Maybe it's her internal instincts after a life-long career in wellness, but for anyone listening, Frazier is just hoping survivors know that step by step, life-saving choices are not as hard as they seem.
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