Five years ago, she told the world she had breast cancer. She made the announcement on national television. It was “Good Morning America” on ABC and it was anchor Robin Roberts. She fought her cancer in the public eye and she handled it with grace and determination. She declared then, that she was a fighter. She promised that her cancer would not get the best of her. She made good on that promise….until this morning.
Robin, with her colleagues sitting on the big comfy couch, around her, listened and watched as she once again told her viewing audience that she is facing another tough battle. This one might be more challenging that the breast cancer. She’s been diagnosed with MDS. Spell it out and it even looks scary: Myelodysplastic Syndrome. It used to be called “pre-leukemia.” It’s a malignant blood and bone marrow disease. MDS is more common in older patients, but it’s also been known to be an effect from other cancer treatments.
Doesn’t make sense does it? Cancer treatment that’s supposed to kill cancer, moves on to find another part of the body, where it can cause cancer? It’s explained as a trigger that can open the gates to new cancer.
Chemotherapy will begin Robins’ treatment path this time around and it will lead her, if she tolerates it well, to the bone marrow transplant that could save her life. This is were the good news part of this sad story comes in…she has a big sister who is the perfect match and will be her donor. The transplant is scheduled for late summer or early fall.
She describes herself as someone who has “always been a fighter.” It’s true too. She was a scrappy baseketball player in her younger years, and she’s survived in television news for a very long time, and you don’t do that, without a lot of moxy.
Even if you don’t know her, she’s back in the community we all know so well….so, support is the name of the game. Fight on Robin…Fight on.
June 12, 2012 @ 1:34 pm
Robin is walking a similar path to my own and my thoughts have been all about her since I heard her news…
My path: When we discussed radiation therapy as a part of my breast cancer treatment, I remember being told that it could possibly cause leukemia in 30 years. I was 38. I went with it. Seven years later when I was diagnosed with multiple myeloma (bone marrow cancer), I was devastated, of course. Treatment included chemo then a stem cell transplant. I was 45. I went with it. Neither of my siblings was a close-enough match; I got chills and reassurance for her when I heard that Robin’s sister is a perfect match. Our secondary cancers may not be curable, but we can give it a good fight and keep it at bay for a long time. (I am 58 now & doing very well.)
Was the treatment worth it and would we do it again given the same choices? Yes and Yes. If I can do it, Robin can do it better.
June 12, 2012 @ 7:51 pm
God bless you and keep you. Thank you for sharing.You give us courage and strength.
June 12, 2012 @ 9:06 am
Irony sometimes fills the cancer world. The treatment that you willingly take to eradicate the current cancer causes another malignant disease to occur. But in hindsight, she’d do it all over again and take her chances for the future just to get rid of breast cancer. I wish her well and hope that her sister’s bone marrow will rid her of this new malignancy. Statistically, it should. But we all know of situations where the bone marrow transplant even from a sibling with a near perfect match does do the job. Everything sounds good so far and I pray that the outcome will be a success story.
June 12, 2012 @ 6:17 am
My heart goes out to this brave woman…………still lifting
June 11, 2012 @ 8:34 pm
I wish her the best, I wish her the tolerance to chemo, to the transplant and to the recovery. As a survivor she can’t think every again, ‘well just how bad could it be’ as the answer is already known.
But with that knowledge she can enter into the fray knowing she did it and can do it again.
Good luck to her.
June 11, 2012 @ 7:29 pm
We get warned this is possible, but I think no one believe it will really happen. At least, we hope it never will. Our thoughts are going out to Robin – may she find the strength to keep on pushing.