Tamoxifen and Zoladex

I was on tamoxifen and zoladex for two and a half years. My belief was that both of those together would stop any recurrence, especially a recurrence of the same er+ pr+ breast cancer. After all, tamoxifen is used to block or kill any cells and zoladex puts my ovaries to sleep, so I will be producing little to no estrogen. For two and a half years I was in menopause, hot flashes, the works. I was safe, at least from getting breast cancer again, maybe I would get a secondary cancer but it wouldn't return in my breasts, right? WRONG.
Apparently, there is only a 4% chance of a recurrence or being diagnosed with breast cancer in the other breast when on this treatment . I am in that 4%.
My point, if you are on this treatment, keep checking your breasts, don't think that this treatment will stop your chances of getting breast cancer again. It does lower your chances, yes, but it doesn't stop the cancer from coming back. Be and stay vigilant.


Tamoxifen and Zoladex (chemical name: goserelin) are hormonal therapy medicines used to lower the risk of breast cancer coming back (recurrence) in premenopausal women diagnosed with early-stage, hormone-receptor-positive breast cancer. A study found that tamoxifen and Zoladex work about the same to lower the risk of breast cancer coming back.

Estrogen can make hormone-receptor-positive breast cancers grow. Hormonal therapy medicines treat hormone-receptor-positive breast cancers in two ways:

by blocking the action of estrogen in the body
by lowering the amount of estrogen in the body