My name is Maria Pia, and I underwent a quadrantectomy with axillary dissection for breast carcinoma in July 2004, I was 47 years old.
After the surgery, I considered myself cured and accepted the subsequent treatments, radiation and hormone therapy, as something inevitable, given the diagnosis, but without great distress.
In any case, once the therapies were finished, my life resumed its usual hectic pace until December 2005 when the event that was truly shocking for me occurred: the onset of lymphedema... a severely debilitating complication of the surgery.
In January 2006, I started practicing dragon boat with bandaging at the Eur lake in Rome, where the first Italian Donne in Rosa's (Womenin Pink's) team was located, and the lymphedema regressed.
I am the President of Abbraccio Rosa OdV, an association of women who experienced surgical operation due to cancer and sail the waters of the Eur lake on the dragon boat, rediscovering themselves and many friends with whom to share a joyful and healthy life.