A mother’s love: Patty Cardoso’s children inspired her to fight through two bouts of breast cancer

NEW ALBANY — A pain in her right breast spurred a visit to the doctor, but the news she got was good — she was pregnant with her third child, a little girl.

But a mammogram at a follow-up visit after she was born showed a mass in her left breast, where she didn’t expect it. She said if it wasn’t for her youngest daughter, she might not be alive today.

Patty Cardoso credits her two-time survival of breast cancer to all three of her children, from the initial warning to the inspiration to fight for her life.

“It was hard, but I think the babies got me through it because you can’t be depressed and feeling sorry for yourself when you have those three little ones running around happy and needing you,” Cardoso said. “So you just continue doing what you need to do.”

After a mastectomy, 22 breast surgeries and a round of chemotherapy, Cardoso said she doesn’t believe she’ll ever be cancer-free, but she feels like she can face anything in the world. She said her children helped her fight cancer and keep it away for the last 20 years.

The first time around

In 1989, Cardoso got her first breast cancer diagnosis. She was 34 years old and just had her third baby, Andria. Her oldest child, Alanna, hadn’t started elementary school yet and the middle child, Anthony, was still in diapers.

She said with so many small people depending on her, she felt like her only choice was to fight for her life.

“When you have three kids that age, you can’t be depressed,” Cardoso said. “You don’t want your little-bitty kids to see you crying. In one way, they make it harder because you get more tired, but they also kept me going.”

Much of her family hadn’t experienced cancer yet. After the mammogram, she got a biopsy to confirm whether the tumor was cancerous.

“You’re very ignorant when you don’t need to know,” Cardoso said. “I told my husband [Al] I had cancer, but he didn’t really realize what a biopsy was supposed to do.”

After some of that confusion was cleared up, she told the rest of her family. Her parents were upset by the news of the disease and the solution proposed was dramatic — her left breast had to be taken off.

“To be honest, I still don’t like it,” she said. “But if I was going to have cancer, thank goodness it was in something that could be removed.”

Cancer hit her family hard that year. Her father was told he had lung cancer three months after she was diagnosed, then her oldest sister found out she had breast cancer three months after that.

Though there was a lot to dwell on, Cardoso said she kept one priority in the forefront of her mind — the education of her children. She said she set a goal for herself then to make sure she saw all of her children through school.

The mastectomy saved her from her first round of cancer. Though she said she wanted chemotherapy to reduce the risk of a recurrence, she was denied. She kept going and was grateful for beating cancer once, but her second diagnosis would come just a few years later.

Second time around

Cardoso got breast implants after her mastectomy. She said that, oddly enough, the implants could have killed her had they been implanted slightly different.

In 1993, she felt a lump on her right breast. It was just above where the implant was. Had it been under it, she said she may have never known it was there.

“After that, I wouldn’t condone or recommend anyone get breast implants,” Cardoso said.

She said the diagnosis didn’t surprise her. She had been told with the type of cancer she had, it was likely it would show up again. She said she was thankful it was the same kind of cancer, not something new.

This time, her treatment regimen was different. She would go through chemotherapy, one treatment every three weeks, for the next several months.

At first, she said it was easy. She didn’t have many of the negative side effects, she had plenty of energy and could keep up with her children. But the last couple of rounds were rough — she was drained but still had an obligation to her children.

They were a little older this time around. Andria, the baby who just might have saved her, was old enough to play with dolls. Her sister Alanna decided to give a haircut to one of Andria’s Barbie dolls, which initially upset her.

But as they watched her mother lose her hair because of the medication, they cut all the hair off of the doll. Anthony and Al shaved their heads in support of Cardoso and again, she pushed forward.

Though she had already experienced it once, she said a life-threatening disease truly shifted her priorities.

“It changes your attitude in life,” she said. “What’s important in life isn’t important anymore. Bad hair days are a joke because you lose it. I told people I didn’t care if it came in green, I just wanted it back.”

Andria said she still didn’t understand how dire her disease was at the time, but she knew it was bad.

“I didn’t have the greatest idea of what was going on,” Andria said. “I just knew that Mommy was sick. I would see her hair falling out and she was bald. I knew something was going on, but I didn’t know how serious it was.”

After six treatments, she had beat cancer for the second time. But her faith in medicine had all but gone. After 22 surgeries, some of which she said were probably because of negligence, she didn’t think she would ever be rid of cancer.

But she said she’d rather have another diagnosis of cancer than heart disease.

“I’ve beat cancer twice, I can beat it again,” Cardoso said.

Prognosis

While she said she doesn’t think she’ll ever be cancer-free, her outlook on life has changed. She’s met her goal of seeing all of her children through school and watched her oldest daughter get married.

She said she never thought she’d live that long.

“I think you just don’t let small things worry you,” she said. “I remember when I was first diagnosed, I could see someone who was having a bad day and I just wanted to shake them and say ‘hold on a second, I have cancer.’”

But her family pushed her through and supported her throughout her disease. Andria said she couldn’t imagine life without her mother, who she described as the heartbeat of her family.

“It’s just amazing,” Andria said. “I look at her as a big inspiration because she survived it not once, but twice. It makes you appreciate when you have days you’re tired or don’t feel like getting out of bed.

“You’re just kind of like, ‘you know what, why am I complaining?’ We’re so grateful to still have her here.”

Though there’s a chance she could have another recurrence of cancer, she’s confident she can beat it if it ever came back.

“You can’t cure yourself, but I think you have a lot of control and your attitude is so important,” Cardoso said. “From the very beginning, I was determined that nothing was going to beat me, I was going to be bigger and badder than cancer.”

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