Ask-the-Expert Conferences: Family, Friends, Relationships

In these Ask-the-Expert online conferences, our experts answered questions about how breast cancer and its treatment can affect your relationships with your family, friends, and others in your life. Some of the questions include:

• I have undergone removal of my breasts and chemotherapy. What bothers me most is the feeling of insecurity towards my husband, but I know that he loves me. How can I cope with this? Answer.
• I have an 8-year-old daughter who worries that she too will have breast cancer. My mother is a 7-year survivor and I just completed chemotherapy two months ago. We both had mastectomies and she also worries that she will have to have her breast removed. What do I tell her? Answer.
• Do you have any advice for someone entering into a new relationship about revealing my new shape (after mastectomy) to a potential new partner? Answer.
• Is it better to talk individually to each family member about what is happening to me, or should I gather them all together and discuss it with the group? Answer.
• How much exactly should children know about the cancer a parent has? What age groups should or are capable of knowing what? Answer.

The conference transcripts in this section are part of the Breastcancer.org Ask-the-Expert Online Conference program.

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