Closing the Big Deal of Cancer
Local successful realtor Susan Alderdice shares her Breast Cancer experience
By Steve Cornelius
If you have ever been in the market to buy or sell a house , you might have talked to her . You have probably seen her smiling face on a roadside billboard or on a ‘ For Sale ’ in a nearby front yard .
For the past 35 years , local realtor Susan Alderdice has been turning houses into homes for thousands of families in the community . Her radiant smile has greeted a legion of potential home buyers at doorsteps all around the state of Kentucky . For nearly four decades , the successful local realtor overcame countless challenges to pair her clients with the homes of their dreams . But in 2016 , Alderdice had to overcome something much , much bigger .
“ I have always had mammograms done consistently ,” Alderdice stated . “
I ’ ve had like a dark spot or some reason they wanted me to come back to check and it was no big deal . In my late thirties , I actually went to surgery and they did a biopsy and it was okay . So , that was no big deal , but I still wanted to keep up with my annual mammograms .”
“ Six years ago I was suppose to go in for my yearly check-up ,” Alderdice recalled . “ At that time , I was into exercising and I had lost weight . I thought I ’ m not gonna go because this isn ’ t convenient and I will miss my Pilates Class . I told myself , ‘ I ’ m not going ’.”
Like a ‘ sales cue ’ she has listened for a thousand times before in various living rooms across the Commonwealth , Alderdice got a different cue about her own health .
“ For some reason , something in the back of my mind kept saying you really need to go ,” Alderdice stated . “ If you don ’ t , it ’ s like when you schedule something and you don ’ t go , it ’ s hard to get it back on track again .”
So Alderdice talked herself into going in for her yearly mammogram and , as always before , everything seemed fine .
“ They didn ’ t say anything and went back home ,” Alderdice recalled .
“ However , they called me and they said , ‘ we need to do a repeat ’. And I thought no big deal .”
But after she went back , the ultrasound tech just kept going over and over this one particular area under her arm . A concerned
10 • SEKY - Life in Southeast Kentucky September 2022