On a shimmering and still White Rock Lake, aboard her one-woman scull, Henda Salmeron has found a little sliver of heaven in Lakewood. Just as you can’t see much below the lake surface, you can’t see the inner calamity belied by Salmeron’s strong, healthy-looking body and bright smile.

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The area Realtor, Lakewood Neighborhood Association president, and mother of two was diagnosed with stage two breast cancer in July.

“The worst day of my life,” she says. “I sat here and contemplated that I might not live to see my children graduate — from college or maybe even from elementary school.”

It was after she started rowing and lost 20 pounds that she noticed the lump.

“If I hadn’t been this fit, I don’t think I would have ever known it was there. So you could say rowing saved my life.”

By the time doctors examined the tumor, it had grown to four centimeters. It went undetected during a regular mammogram in December — the miss was blamed on dense breast tissue, which can mask a cyst on a mammogram image. An MRI, which ultimately detected the tumor, is not usually covered by health insurance as a screening device, Salmeron says.

She hopes to help others by sharing what she has learned. “I started thinking about what I could do,” she says. “I can’t change the way health insurance companies operate, but maybe I could change the mindset of some women, so that they will become advocates for their own health.”

She has compiled information on her website, densebreasttissue.net, where she also discusses candidly her personal experiences with cancer.

“Part of what I want to do is alleviate some of the fear associated with that big scary word, ‘cancer’, and let people know it’s OK to talk about it.”

She’s working with state lawmakers on a bill that would require that patients receive information about the risks associated with dense breast tissue. And she’s living her life to the fullest — she will race in her first rowing event in Austin at the end of the month.