Beth Steele decided at the last minute to go to the New England Patriots-Cincinnati Bengals game in October 2013, and the decision helped save her life.
October is national Breast Cancer Awareness month, so when Steele, a diehard Pats fan and mother of four, went to the Patriots-Bengals game in Cincinnati last Oct. 6, she took notice of the pink cleats and pink towels.
“I thought of that as a marketing scheme,” Steele said Friday on the “TODAY” show as part of the “Together We Make Football” series. “But something about all the pink, it did make me go home that night and do a self-breast exam.”
Steele, 36, found a lump in her breast and went for her first mammogram. The results came back that Steele had massive and aggressive breast cancer and needed to be seen right away.
“I didn’t even check out with the nursing staff, I just walked down three flights of stairs where (my husband) T.J. was sitting in the minivan, walked around the car so the kids couldn’t see me, and literally laid on the ground and just started sobbing,” Steele said.
The surgeon removed three tumors and found two types of breast cancer, but after Steele’s treatment, her prognosis is excellent.
“If the Patriots had been in town a different month that year, I would not have found my breast cancer,” Steele said. “I would not have survived.”
Patriots owner Robert Kraft invited Steele to serve as honorary captain and to walk out for the coin toss before the team’s win over the Oakland Raiders at Gillette Stadium on Sept. 21.
Photo via Kirby Lee/USA TODAY Sports
