Lisa, 32, thought she had overdone the exercise, now friends are raising money for her funeral
A mum thought muscle ache and a pea-sized lump in her left breast was due to exercising too hard before discovering it was a symptom of her triple-negative breast cancer. Lisa Foster, 32, felt like her lump “rose overnight” and visited her GP in June 2023 fearing she’d worked too hard on her new exercise bike.
But after a referral to a breast care specialist at the Royal Surrey Hospital, Guildford, and a biopsy, the mum-of-one was diagnosed with stage three triple-negative ductal sarcoma. She received treatment across the next year, including a single mastectomy and EC chemotherapy – but a scan in January 2024 revealed the cancer had progressed to stage four, and was incurable.
Now in her final weeks, mum-of-one Lisa and her husband, Adam, 31, a mechanic, say they’re desperate for people to know that “cancer isn’t just an old person’s disease” – and urge women to check their breasts regularly. Adam, who now cares for Lisa full-time, from Aldershot, Hampshire, said: “We want people to know that cancer can affect anyone, at any age – Lisa is a young mum who thought she just had a gym injury.
“We’re all devastated – she’s such a kind-hearted person, and the world’s going to be a bit darker without her. Lisa and I have been together a long old time – we met when we were 15.
“I don’t want to imagine what things will be like when she’s gone.”
In May 2023, just after Lisa’s 30th birthday, she decided to buy an exercise bike for her bedroom due to feeling self-conscious after the birth of her daughter, now four. But “overnight” she began feeling a pulled muscle on her left breast and, when she examined it, found a pea-sized lump.
Despite thinking it was just a mild injury from riding her bike, Lisa booked an appointment with her GP just in case. She was given antibiotics and told to keep an eye on the lump – but when it didn’t go down a week later, she was urgently referred to a breast care specialist for a biopsy.
“Our GP is fantastic, they were on it straight away,” Adam said. “Within three weeks from symptoms beginning, she was in for her biopsy.”
One week after the biopsy, Lisa received her results – she was diagnosed with stage three triple-negative ductal sarcoma, and told she’d need mastectomy, three months of chemotherapy and 12 rounds of immunotherapy. In October 2023, Lisa underwent four rounds of EC chemotherapy, after three months of immunotherapy, before having a single mastectomy and lymph node removal in January 2024.
Her care team gave her a week to recover, before giving her a scan to see if she was well enough to undergo radiotherapy. Adam said: “She wasn’t well enough – the cancer spread to her chest wall, her right breast and her liver. We were told she was now at stage four.”
Lisa tried four different medications to give her the best shot at overcoming the disease – including a drug trial at the Sarah Cannon Research Facility in Harley Street, Marylebone, London. But efforts to treat her cancer were fruitless – and on June 4, Lisa was told the next round of chemotherapy had just a 9% chance of working.
She has been offered a form of oral chemotherapy called capecitabine, but has been warned it could reduce her prognosis from two weeks to just two days. A friend of the mum-of-one, Becky Bailey, has set up a GoFundMe to help fund Lisa’s funeral.
“I can’t thank everyone who’s already donated enough,” Adam said. “Now, people who want to help, but can’t make it in person, have been able to put a bit towards the funeral costs.
“It just goes to show that Lisa has touched the lives of every single person she’s met.
“She’s bubbly, funny – such a ray of sunshine, even her oncologist would book her appointments at the end of the day in case they needed cheering up.”
The GoFundMe can be found here: https://www.gofundme.com/f/lisa-foster-aka-princess-warrior