During this prolonged period of indoor-isolation, some — like actor-comedian, Julia Louis-Dreyfus — are heading to the hills for fresh-air and exercise, at a safe distance, of course. “Social distance hike with my pal @theellenshow,” Louis-Dreyfus wrote on Instagram yesterday. “We had a great conversation, although I couldn't really hear what she was saying.”
View this post on InstagramRead More Ellen’s response: “I said ‘is that a rattlesnake over there?'”RELATED: Could Julia Louis-Dreyfus Be the Funniest, Most Inspiring Breast Cancer Survivor of All Time?
Fans were thrilled, “Stay safe! We need you and Ellen in our lives! â¤,” one wrote. Others pointed out that phones could solve the problem for the pair.“I’ve Washed Away My Fingerprints”
Earlier in the week, Louis-Dreyfus made a cameo appearance in a video with her son, Henry, as he sang the alphabet song while washing his hands. A confessed clean-freak, Louis-Dreyfus shared on Jimmy Kimmel Live!, that her hand-washing obsession has escalated during the coronavirus outbreak: "I've washed away my fingerprints," she said. As a result, she joked, her smartphone’s touch-technology no longer recognizes her.
While quarantined with her husband and two grown sons, Kimmel asked if she’s in charge of the cooking: “I am and it’s irritating the hell out of me,” she responded. “I don’t like to cook this much. It’s three grown men and myself. It’s a lot of food.”
What’s helped, she offered, is “going outside and walking or hiking. That really just calms me down.”
Many in the SurvivorNet community would agree. But even outdoors, social-distancing remains crucial to stemming the spread of the virus.
Julia Louis-Dreyfus’ Breast Cancer Journey
Her breast cancer was not detected during a routine mammogram. Instead, when Louis-Dreyfus noticed a concerning ‘divot’ in her breast in 2017, she scheduled a visit with her doctor. Her proactive response led to an early diagnosis in September of that year, making her breast cancer easier to treat. She went on to have a double mastectomy and 6 rounds of chemotherapy.
Like so many cancer survivors, the Emmy-winning actress found that the shock of the initial diagnosis left her at a loss about how to respond…about work, treatment, and her future in general.
“Restoring sensation to the patient’s breast…is the final frontier of breast reconstruction,” says Dr. Dung Nguyen, Director of Breast Reconstruction at Stanford University’s Women's Cancer Center.
She opened up about the complications of planning the filming schedule for the final season of HBO's hit show “Veep” in the immediate aftermath of her September 2017 diagnosis.
Although her initial instinct was to continue working on Veep while undergoing cancer treatment, she eventually accepted the reality that she’d need to take time off from the show.
It's a reality familiar to many as they face cancer treatment.
"For a couple of days not knowing this road I was about to walk down, not fully understanding, and possibly in a sort of state of denial, too I was thinking, 'Well, we'll shoot around chemo. We'll figure it out,’" Louis-Dreyfus told Entertainment Weekly in an interview. "I had that idea, which is, of course, absurd. But I didn't think of it as such until reality came crashing in."
The Mastectomy Decision
Mastectomy is the removal of the entire breast during surgery, and it is a very common treatment for breast cancer. While Louis-Dreyfus chose a bilateral mastectomy, there are a number of factors to weigh when considering surgery, chief among them is whether breast-conserving surgery (or lumpectomy) is possible.
Your doctor will look at the size and features of your tumor as well as your family history in order to make a recommendation.
A lot of women who are at high risk of developing breast cancer also decide to have mastectomies in order to prevent it.
"Depending on the size and other features, such as family history, a patient may opt for more aggressive surgery," says Dr. Elizabeth Comen, Medical Oncologist at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. "And so even for early, stage-one breast cancer, a woman may elect a mastectomy to remove her whole breast."
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