Janice Stompro's Story

Cooking up the funds to
Fight Breast Cancer


I have always feared breast cancer and always expected to get it, since my mother and grandmother have it. Lucky for me, they are both survivors. I routinely examined myself and had mammograms, but still my worst fears were confirmed in May of 1999. I was 39 years old and faced with many choices.

I was walking by the mirror naked one day and noticed an odd dimpling on my skin, over my right nipple. The next day I went in to have a mammogram and sure enough something suspicious showed. The radiologist confirmed a one-centimeter tumor and said it would not have been picked up on a routine mammogram and I was fortunate to be able to show him the exact spot of dimpling.

I went in for a biopsy and it came back malignant. I then scheduled a lumpectomy and had the procedure done but was told that I would have to come back for a mastectomy. The one-centimeter tumor ended up being 8-10 centimeters. My tumor was called “lobular” and the chances are great that my healthy breast would become infected so I opted for double mastectomies. When the pathology came back on my healthy breast, something was already starting. My lobular cancer only showed on mammogram and ultrasound as a one-centimeter tumor. It was very scary, that being so careful for so many years I didn't find it until it was huge. My husband, Dr. Brett Stompro, who is a Plastic and Reconstructive Surgeon, placed expanders at the time of my mastectomies. I went through breast reconstruction and a round of chemotherapy, which was one of the most difficult things I have ever done.

While recovering, I thought a lot about my 7-year-old daughter, Sia. Her great-grandmother, grandmother and mother could very well have given her the breast cancer gene. What was I going to do to save her from the ravages of this disease as well as maybe saving her life? I decided to put together a cookbook and called it “Recipes for Research”. I enlisted the help of friends, family and celebrities and asked for everyone’s best recipes and compiled an awesome cookbook to sell. 100% of the net proceeds are being donated to Breast Cancer Research.

Our first volume of “Recipes for Research” did so well that we decided to print a new cookbook every year. I never realized what an outpouring of support I would get from the community in which I live. I have also had the chance to touch the lives of women recently diagnosed with breast cancer and help with their recovery process. My hope is that everyone reading about my story will join me in my fight against breast cancer by purchasing the book for themselves or a loved one so that women in the future will not have to go through what so many of us have.

Thank you, in advance for your support.

Janice Stompro
President, Recipes for Research