What would you do if your normal trips to the bathroom became an insurmountable burden? If holding onto a teaspoon became a Herculean task?

This became 24-year-old Kealeboga Montwedi's life when she was diagnosed with cancer in 2007. A young mother to daughter Mbali, Kealeboga, like so many other young women, believed that breast cancer or any form of cancer would 'never happen to her'.

Kealeboga, who has been embroiled in a tug-of-war with this fatal illness for over three years, describes her first alarming sign as a pea-seized lump in her breast, which, for a while, she mistook for just another process in the last stages of her growing breasts.

"Months went and there was no change except that the lump kept growing, it persistently took over my mind because I couldn't understand why even the doctors couldn't see any wrong with it, while it kept growing and certainly proved not being in any relation to growing breasts."

Kealeboga describes how some of her most precious moments with her daughter were with her at her breast: "When I stopped breastfeeding Mbali I was really sad and vowed that very soon I would grant her a little brother or sister."

Demanding a mammogram

She recalls the moment she insisted on having a mammogram, which she was told is only performed on adults over 40. Although the pain of the memory has blurred with time, she still remembers the doctor breaking the news to her: "you have been diagnosed with a high grade Ductal Carcinoma in situ (DCIS)".

At first Kealeboga became pre-occupied with the thoughts of what she would have to face, but this was quickly replaced with concern for her young daughter.

"'Where will she receive the motherly love she deserves when I am gone?' I cried myself to sleep asking God to spare my life for her, at least till I saw her in school uniform."

A further appointment with a breast cancer surgeon revealed more bad news for Kealeboga — the lump in her breast had grown to the size of a golf ball, measuring 5.5-centimetres. This pointed to the aggressive nature of her cancer, but that was not the end of it; the cancer had spread to her uterus and ovaries. At this point, she felt herself journey to the edge of despair.

Not always a death sentence

As is the case for many people, the reality of Kealeboga's diagnosis did not fit with her misconceived belief that as a young, healthy, fit and clean-living woman, she was precluded from getting cancer.

Nevertheless, Kealeboga remained convinced that her cancer was the equivalent of a death sentence, and braced herself for a prognosis of only a few months to live.

She immediately began chemotherapy, which she describes as a poison meant to shrink your lungs, a nightmare which diverts you back to being a baby as you can barely lift a teaspoon and everything else just becomes tasteless; normal day-to-day activities slowly become a mission.

The young woman became weak with time, life changed and she could feel the clock ticking away the minutes of her life.

"At the age of 24 I had a bilateral mastectomy as a result of oestrogen and progesterone receptor positive breast cancer, followed by six cycles of intensive chemotherapy and seven weeks of radiation. I also had two reconstruction operations and oophorectomy to remove my uterus and ovaries.

"I now know that I carry the BRCA2 gene mutation and I have to bear the responsibility of this fact, especially as I have one child, my baby girl Mbali."

Bosom Buddies

Kealeboga knows there is no going back to the person she was before the cancer. She has been given a second chance at life, with the greatest challenge thus far being the reintegration back into dominant society; a path which most have not walked.

"Till this day, the birthday gift which I give to myself is a visit to the doctor who performs a general medical check-up of my body."

"May many women receive this in good health and take my experience as an opportunity for them to get to know their bodies and act on anything that is at the slightest abnormality in their body. Cancer can spread, it can leave, and it can come back!"

Kealeboga celebrates this Cancer Awareness Month with the women of 'Bosom Buddies', a group of women who have devoted their lives to supporting women fighting the battle against cancer. Though she is in the clear, Kealeboga carries the flag for other women fighting the battle, hoping that they too will conquer the illness.