Breast Cancer Takes a Hike

Pasadena resident Sophia Chang’s breast cancer story began like so many others: “I was taking a shower when I felt a little lump.”

That was back in August 2020, when she was 46, with no family history of breast cancer. Since then, she’s told cancer to take a hike, and often does the same herself. We caught up with Chang right after her annual hike with friends and family in Glendale’s Deukmejian Wilderness Park, which Chang has organized every October for the past four years to bring greater awareness of the breast cancer experience to others, and to celebrate her own survivorship.

“This year, my husband planned the hike,” she laughs. “We all told him we wanted something easy and short. Ha! And then we sort of got lost! The trail got so narrow that we literally had to hug the wall to get back down.”

Taiwan-born Chang meets life’s twists and turns with the analytical attitude that sustained her long tech career with Microsoft while living in Seattle. She says “What I have gotten from my journey is to let go, to let more things pass, and not dwell on little things.” This pragmatism, however, in no way resembles complacency. She’s seemingly hard-wired for consistent, disciplined personal habits including physical fitness and exercise, a fact which she believes has strengthened her recovery. 

Chang says that she began playing tennis prior to her diagnosis, and friends she made on the court rose to the occasion when she began cancer treatment. “Tennis and hiking are obviously good for the heart, the lungs,” she says. “But the support I received from my tennis community gave me a different kind of strength, and helped restore my well-being.”

On the subject of breast cancer, Chang is characteristically matter-of-fact. “When I found the lump in my left breast, I immediately went to the City of Hope. We soon discovered that I had a really aggressive form of cancer, and that it had spread to a lymph node, and so I started chemo. My body responded well to the chemotherapy, which reduced my lump by 70 to 80 percent. As a result, my surgery was quite moderate. I also had radiation. Then, three months later, I organized our first hike of 30 or 40 family members and close friends.”

She’s been symptom-free since.

Until quite recently, East Asian women as a general group have been cited as the enviable antithesis of their American counterparts in terms of breast cancer risk. The stark difference was attributed to now-familiar differences, primarily a lifestyle which included regular physical movement, a plant-based diet, no processed foods, and close familial and cultural bonds.

However, the equation quickly began to shift as the Western monoculture—television, sedentary stress, synthetic snacks— reached Asia and elsewhere. A 2019 CDC study, for instance, observes that immigrant Asian women now face a higher breast-cancer risk than their US-born Asian American counterparts, suggesting that the triggers may be environmental versus genetic.

Even more curious, emerging research suggests that advanced education, high socio-economic status, and home ownership appear to bump up the incidence among immigrant Asian American women, especially among those who have spent 50 percent or more of their lives in the US.

Chang says, “There’s a lot in life that we can’t control. I understand that at some point down the road, my cancer may resurface. But I try to be practical and realistic. I diligently take Tamoxifen every day, I don’t ever skip my medication. And I’m conscious of what I eat. I’m careful about red meat, and no more cow’s milk.”

She’s officially retired now, and keeps a watchful eye over her son long-distance as he finishes study abroad in Italy, and will begin classes at Boston University in January 2025. “He’s just 18 and a half,” she says. “Life is so short, and although of course mammograms are important and so on, what I have realized is the ultimate importance of mental health. Unexpected things happen. We have to get beyond our fear and face the unknown as well as painful realities, because attitude really affects outcomes.”