A retired magician shares his solitary journey with male breast cancer

As a magician, Khevin Barnes made a trade out of the unexpected, but before retiring, his job had to be aware of, and surprise others.

Khevin did not know that men could have breast cancer. He then had a mammogram, then a mastectomy.

More than 99% of all diagnosed breast cancer cases are women. The odds that a man gets breast cancer are 1,000 to 1.

Khevin is that one.

Survivor of the disease for four years, Khevin, now 68, has made a life of warning about breast cancer.

"I was one of those I was one of the men who had no idea that men could even have breast cancer," he says.

In 2014, he had a "bump" on the left side of his chest. Even today, while most women refer to palpable tumors as "lumps," Khevin uses a different language.

However, he saw nothing to fear. He and his wife lived in a Zen center in Honolulu, Hawaii, where they spent their days meditating and practicing a peaceful and substance-free lifestyle as part of an extended residency program.

Khevin had retired He thought that he should show all due diligence and see his primary care physician

"All was well, everything seemed fine, and I thought to myself:" I'm fine, "said Kevin, but my wife, bless her heart, she said" Why do not you ask her to check that little lump on your left chest? "

Khevin's Was complaining to her just a couple of times about the place. The "tiny little bump" was nothing awful, just a little boring.

But soon he was scheduled for a mammogram, a procedure that he had never understood.

During Mother's Day, while Khevin was visiting his mother who was sick after breaking his hip, he received a voice message that seemed scripted from a movie that no one would want to play .

"I'm sorry but I have some bad news," says his doctor. When he made his appeal, the doctor informed Khevin that he had breast cancer, stage one, but third grade, which meant that they had caught the cancer early, but that was not the case. was an aggressive form.

"The reason most men are diagnosed at a much more advanced stage – usually three or four – is that the guys are a little quivering, they have a little lump and think that's the cause of Khevin's survival. Something else, it is that at other times, it is the others who say to go check it, "he declared

" We are sort of the ones last to worry, "he added.

His doctor told Khevin to focus on his time with his mother and not to worry until he returned to Hawaii. 19659002] "On the plane back home, it hit me: I have a male breast cancer," recalls Khevin.It was hard to understand why he had to fight for his life against a disease of which he was never afraid.

Nevertheless, Khevin and his medical team did not waste time once back in Hawaii, he was treated quickly for a mastectomy and left with a precious little tissue and no nipple on the left side of his chest

Typically, the next step in treating breast cancer would have been chemotherapy, but Khevin knew already that the

Seven years ago, his first wife, Meg Chrysler Barnes, had died of ovarian cancer at age 47 and despite the chemo.

For three years before her death, Khevin was Meg's constant guardian as treatment after treatment failed to restore her health.

"I watched the whole process and she often said that she would have liked not to do it [chemo]," he says. "(19659002) But his idyllic home on the island became a kind of symbol for his diagnosis over a thousand years

" Being in Hawaii. "I felt rather isolated in general," says Khevin

. He and his wife, Gaga, have returned to "dry land". and settled in Arizona, but, of course, there were more men sharing the experience of Khevin in Hawaii

Each year there are about 260,000 new breast cancer, but only 2,500 in men. 19659002] To avoid the loneliness of his diagnosis, Khevin began writing letters to his family, friends and other cancer patients. He got involved in Anti-Cancer Club, and started writing about his experience on the support group website.

Soon, he wrote his own blog about male breast cancer and then for CURE magazine. Khevin says

"" [Breast cancer] is a case – if you want to call it that – that a very big part is about the women's support was amazing, "says he, but "men have breasts and can have breast cancer. "

He has given himself the mission of being the symbol of male breast cancer.-Being as well as an educator.He even wrote a musical about breast cancer [19659002] "Many men [who have had breast cancer] do not want to pose with their shirt, and we do not have the same link to the breasts as women, on the social level. Khevin says

"One of the things we need to do is educate the practitioners.Men really do not know how to tell men to check their breasts, so we are also getting closer to that end, by going to men and the professionals. "

Khevin checks her breast tissue in the shower, and" I have a 80% chance of living probably 10 years if I do not do anything, I feel good for five years and I'm not sure. I have no symptoms, "says Khevin

. Even though cancer has reappeared tomorrow, it's been a good four years. "

But that would not have been possible if Gaga had not been there to ask his Doctor about this size of a pea.

" Listen your significant other, have your business checked. We are so thin about needles and everything, but, I'll tell you what, it's much better than a mastectomy, "says Khevin