" Holly Stoltz loved teaching dance. She loved the kids, she loved seeing them learn, she loved all kinds of dancing ? tap, jazz, ballet, modern. "

" So when she was diagnosed with breast cancer at age 26 and had to quit dancing for a while, it was tough. "

" But with the support of her family, and the extended family at her dance studio, she got through it. "

" One day, toward the end of her chemotherapy treatments, she longed to get back to dancing but knew it was too early, so she attended a dance recital, in style. "

" The modern dance class at Dance Art in Fenton and Eureka was performing "Walk Like an Egyptian," so Stoltz and the teacher conspired to surprise the school. "

" Stoltz had the headpiece and the togalike outfit, but one thing she didn't have was the eyelashes."

" "I went to put on mascara and noticed that my eyelashes had fallen out, too," she says. "I was surprised, but all I could do was laugh." "

" "I think it touched some people," she says. "Everybody knows somebody who has breast cancer, but they think it's a death sentence. Here, they saw someone young get it, and I wanted them to see it in a new light.""

" One day three years ago, at the age of 26, Stoltz woke up and got into the shower. Then she bumped her breast. "It felt kind of tender.""

" So she got out of the shower and did a self-exam. Her maternal grandmother died of breast cancer when Stoltz was 8, so she knew what it could do to a family, and she knew about breast self-exams. "

" She didn't exactly feel a lump but a line that went straight down "like a pencil." She called her dad, a veterinarian, to ask his opinion. He said it was probably a swollen lymph node, but to keep an eye on it. A couple of weeks later, she happened to have her yearly exam with her doctor. She asked him about it. He said it was probably a fibroid cyst. "

" But a week later, before she was set to teach a dance class, she noticed a discharge from her nipple. "

" "I came out of the bathroom and was like, 'Oh, my God, oh, my God.' I started crying," she says. "

" Then she called her mom's best friend, a nurse practitioner, who told her to see a doctor. "

" She went alone to see the doctor. They did a mammogram but detected nothing, as is often the case with younger breasts because they are denser. So Stoltz also underwent an ultrasound."

" "The whole time I was crying, talking myself into it," she says. "I said, 'If this is what it is, we'll take it step by step.' I remember rocking back and forth." "

" "She was quite upset," Stoltz remembers, "but she was more angry that I hadn't told her before." "

" The next day, her mom accompanied her to the surgeon's office. Stoltz was diagnosed with ductal carcinoma in situ, a normally noninvasive cancer. "

" "I was in shock," she says. "I knew there was a chance, but I didn't think it would be me at 26. Yet I had a gut feeling this is what was going to happen." "

" The biopsy removed the lump, but there were no clear margins, meaning the cancer had spread further than thought. In fact, it had spread to her lymph nodes, unusual for this type of cancer. "

" She thought about it, researched it and talked to one friend who helped her make up her mind. "

" "One of my friends who had breast cancer at 40 said she regretted not having both breasts removed because she worried about getting cancer in the other one constantly." "

" Her parents supported her decision and helped her choose the right oncologist and plastic surgeon. She had the tumor removed and her breasts reconstructed at the same time. "

" "All I know is I woke up in a lot of pain," Stoltz says. "You don't realize how much you use your pectoral muscles until they are not there.""

" Because the cancer had spread to her lymph nodes, her oncologist wanted to be aggressive with her treatment. She underwent six doses of chemotherapy and seven doses of radiation. "

" For the next five years she'll be on tamoxifen, a drug prescribed for women with hormone-receptor-positive
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