Monday, March 23, 2015

Thank you Angelina

Just wanted to share this article that Angelina Jolie wrote today that really feels like she's speaking to me! Not only do we have the same birthday and both have hot husbands, but we both have "the gene." She has the BRCA1 gene while I have the BRCA2 gene but both mean that we have high risk for breast cancer (check) and ovarian cancer. I have taken care of the breast cancer thing for good HOPEFULLY, (I'm being checked every 3 months now) but ovarian cancer still scares the bejeezus out of me. From this article I learned that there is a blood test to check for a presence of early signs of ovarian cancer… I'm not sure why I haven't heard of this, maybe because I'm not Angelina Jolie? But I'm definitely going to ask my doctor about it! Angelina recently found out she had signs pointing towards early ovarian cancer and was still able to have her ovaries removed to take care of it. My doctor has suggested a full hysterectomy (which basically equals forced menopause) for me by age 35 at the latest… so I have that to look forward to. If I was done having kids I'd have that surgery immediately. So-- I guess my surprise baby on the way coming earlier than expected was a good thing in more ways than one!!! I'm so happy my body was able to create a life naturally so soon after receiving chemo and I'll have to start thinking about all of my options to deal with the threat of ovarian cancer more seriously very soon. Anyways, just wanted to share this article by Angelina in case it can help anybody else in the same situation!! I'm going to start writing more and will check in again soon :) XO

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/24/opinion/angelina-jolie-pitt-diary-of-a-surgery.html?smid=tw-nytopinion&_r=0