Looking At The Relationship Between Cancer Warriors Jennifer Grey and Patrick Swayze
- Dirty Dancing actors Jennifer Grey and Patrick Swayze did not always get along while on the sets together. In a recent interview to promote her new memoir, Out of the Corner, Grey shared that Swayze was once in “tears” over his treatment of her prior to Dirty Dancing.
- Swayze was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in March 2008, and passed away in September 2009, at age 57. Grey previously battled thyroid cancer and treated it with surgery.
- Thyroid cancer, like many other cancers, can be difficult to spot and early cancer detection is key to successful treatment. So, it is important to talk to a doctor if you have any concerns about your body.
- Pancreatic cancer is an aggressive disease that is difficult to detect because symptoms including jaundice and weight loss typically present at a later stage in the cancer's development.
Prior to the release of fan-favorite Dirty Dancing, Grey, 62, and Swayze also worked together on Red Dawn. But in a recent interview to promote her new memoir, Out of the Corner, the mother to actress Stella Gregg, 20, shared that her experience with Swayze was less than ideal.
Read More“He pulled me down the hall and said to me, ‘I love you, I love you, and I’m so sorry. And I know you don’t want me to do the movie,'” Grey recalled. “And he got the tears in his eyes. And I got the tears in my eyes not for the same reason. I was like, ‘Oh, this guy’s working me.’
“And he goes, ‘We could kill it we could kill it if we did this.'”
But as soon as the two started dancing together, Grey knew he was the one for the role.
“We go in there and he takes me in his arms and I was like, ‘Oh, boy. I’m done,'” she said. “There was no competition. He was, like, the easy chair I’d been dreaming of my whole life.”
Learning About Thyroid Cancer: Jennifer Grey’s Disease
Following surgery on her spine due to a car accident she had with then-boyfriend Matthew Broderick in 1987, Grey's doctor told her X-rays showed that there was a cancerous growth on her thyroid. Grey said that doctors were able to surgically remove her thyroid before the cancer spread to other areas of her body. She did not need chemotherapy or radiation therapy for treatment.
Thyroid cancer is a type of cancer that starts in the thyroid gland which makes hormones that help regulate your metabolism, heart rate, blood pressure and body temperature. Treatments for this type of cancer can include surgery, hormone therapy, radioactive iodine, radiation and chemotherapy.
Spotting thyroid cancer can often be difficult. The American Cancer Society reports that symptoms may include a lump, swelling or pain in the neck, voice changes, trouble swallowing or breathing or even a constant cough.
"Most people have no discrete symptoms the majority of cases now are found incidentally," Dr. Allen Ho, a head and neck surgeon at Cedars-Sinai Hospital, tells SurvivorNet. "However, a sizable number of people may first discover their cancer when they feel a bump on their neck. Other possible late symptoms include problems swallowing, the sensation of something in their throat, neck compression when laying flat or voice changes."
The good news is that many of these possible symptoms, including lumps in the thyroid, are both common and commonly benign but it never hurts to ask your doctor. Chances of cancer recovery increase significantly with early detection, so it's important to address any warning signs of thyroid cancer, or any cancer for that matter, with a medical expert swiftly.
Patrick Swayze's Cancer Battle
Swayze was first diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in March 2008, and he later passed away at the too-young age of 57, after fighting the disease for over a year. Swayze died in September 2009 leaving behind his wife, actress Lisa Niemi, 65.
Remembering Iconic '80s and '90s Actor Patrick Swayze Who Passed from Pancreatic Cancer in 2009
The actor first began experiencing symptoms of pancreatic cancer in December 2007, but he didn't realize it at the time he thought he was just having digestive issues. Swayze wrote in his 2009 memoir, The Time of My Life, how he thought the bloated feeling would just go away on its own.
"I had been having some digestive trouble," he wrote. "Mostly acid reflux and a kind of bloated feeling, for a few weeks. I've had a sensitive stomach my whole life, so I hadn't thought much of it, but lately, I just couldn't shake the constant discomfort."
Pancreatic Cancer Detection
Pancreatic cancer is an aggressive disease that is difficult to detect because symptoms including jaundice and weight loss typically present at a later stage in the cancer's development. In a previous interview with SurvivorNet, Dr. Anirban Maitra, the co-leader of the Pancreatic Cancer Moon Shot at MD Anderson Cancer Center, explains what he typically sees when patients develop this disease.
"Because the pancreas is inside the abdomen often doesn't have symptoms that would tell you that something is wrong with your pancreas," he says. "By the time individuals walk into the clinic with symptoms like jaundice, weight loss, back pain or diabetes, it's often very late in the stage of the disease."
Detecting Pancreatic Cancer Early Is Crucial
Parents, siblings and children of someone with pancreatic cancer are considered high risk for developing the disease because they are first-degree relatives of the individual. PGVs (pathogenic germline variants) are changes in reproductive cells (sperm or egg) that become part of the DNA in the cells of the offspring. Germline variants are passed from parents to their children, and are associated with increased risks of several cancer types, including pancreatic, ovarian and breast cancers. Germline mutations in ATM, BRCA1, BRCA2, CKDN2A, PALB2, PRSS1, STK11 and TP53 are associated with increased risk of pancreatic cancer.
Jessica Everett, a genetic counselor at NYU Langone's Perlmutter Cancer Center, encourages people in this category to look into possible screening options.
"If you're concerned about pancreatic cancer in your family, start by talking to a genetic counselor to learn more about your risk and what options you have," Everett said.
Contributing: Anne McCarthy
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