Marcia's Anal Cancer Treatment Side Effects
- Actress Marcia Cross, 58, was diagnosed with anal cancer in November 2017 after a routine gynecological check-up, which included a digital rectal exam, and caught the cancer.
- In a new interview, the actress details the side effects of her treatment for anal cancer and credits her gynecologist for discovering her disease.
- A stigma sometimes accompanies this disease, and Cross is admirably working to end it.
Marcia’s Anal Cancer Battle
Despite having a good prognosis, there were bumps along the way. In a new interview with Coping magazine, Cross spoke openly about her anal cancer journey and the treatment side effects "the side effects are so gnarly," she said. Cross told Coping, "I will say that when I had my first chemo treatment, I thought I was doing great. And then out of nowhere, I felt this sting in my lip; it was excruciating. It was from the chemo.”
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Cross found other symptoms, apart from the sting in her lip, and she decided to get a headstart on what laid ahead for her. “I did learn after that to be proactive,” the actress said, “and get ahead of things because I thought, 'I don't need that rinse, or these drugs, or whatever,' and then I found myself in the thick of it, and I had gastric problems, mouth sores, all the terrible things that can happen with chemotherapy … It's certainly not fun."
Cross has said her disease was HPV-related. In an earlier interview with SurvivorNet, she said, “It was, in fact, HPV-related anal cancer. So I didn’t have any symptoms. Never had an irregular pap smear. I had never heard of HPV until my husband. We both probably carried it for most of our lives. I think there’s just a vast lack of knowledge about HPV and how it’s spread, how we carry it, what happens to it when you have it.”
Ending the Anal Cancer Stigma
For slightly obvious reasons, people diagnosed with anal cancer might be subject to the unwarranted stigma that may accompany this disease, in the way a stigma may accompany testicular cancer. Despite both being cancers of the reproductive and gastrointestinal body parts, there is no shame in getting either diagnosis. Marcia Cross is admirably working to end the stigma that may accompany anal cancer.
Cross told Coping about her end-the-stigma efforts, saying, "Here's the thing, I wasn't interested in becoming the anal cancer spokesperson…But, as I was going through it, I read repeatedly about people who were ashamed, who were hiding, who were lying about their diagnosis. And on the other side, how doctors were not comfortable talking about it…I just saw how, oh my gosh, we are so behind on all of this because it's our anuses! For whatever reason, I don't have any shame about that. I'm a big fan of the anus … I just have a lot of respect for this tiny, little two inches that makes our lives livable and pleasant. I really think to destigmatize it is the way to go. It's just silly … We all have one. It's nothing to be embarrassed or ashamed of."
Cross, along with her fellow anal cancer survivor and friend, Lillian Kreppel, launched a charity called HPV Alliance, which is dedicated to sharing information, spreading awareness of the disease, and pushing for prevention. The way Cross has used her platform and diagnosis to improve the lives of others is so admirable, and the cancer community remains grateful for all the work she’s done to raise awareness and fight the stigma of anal cancer.
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