10 researched ways to reduce your breast cancer risk

I don’t know about you, but I was so sad to hear that actress Shannen Doherty’s cancer is back… and with a vengeance.

If you grew up watching Beverly Hills 90210 as I did, then you probably know Shannen’s brave breast cancer battle began in 2015. She opted for anti-estrogen therapy to shrink her tumor in hopes of getting a lumpectomy rather than a mastectomy. But there were just too many tumors. Surgery during the mastectomy revealed her cancer had spread beyond the lymph nodes. She underwent chemotherapy and radiation, and even enjoyed a couple of years in remission. But on February 4, 2020, Shannon announced she’s been secretly battling cancer that returned in 2019 and is now in stage four.

In an interview that appeared on ABC News, Shannen had this to say of her battle with cancer, “I don’t think that I’ve processed it,” she said. “It’s a bitter pill to swallow in a lot of ways. I definitely have days where I say, ‘Why me?’ And then I go, ‘Well why not me? Who else? Who else besides me deserves this?’ None of us do.”

But it’s a risk many of us worry about, and some, more so than others, have an elevated risk. Though genetics certainly play a part, and some breast cancers are more aggressive than others, we can all do our part to lessen those risks.

Here are some of the best-researched healthy habits to help reduce breast cancer risk…