Katie Couric Expresses Gratitude After Cancer Diagnosis
- Katie Couric shared a sweet sentiment with her 1.5 million Instagram followers in the days leading up to Christmas weekend.
- Couric announced earlier this year that she had been diagnosed with early stage breast cancer and underwent a lumpectomy and radiation to treat it.
- The TV journalist and author shared that one of the hardest parts of her cancer experience was telling her daughters especially since they lost their father to colon cancer.
For the holidays, though, Couric was all about embracing a thankful mindset. She shared a sweet “PSA” about holiday gift-giving to her 1.5 million Instagram followers. “Don’t come at me with your little gift bag or Christmas tin and be all ‘it’s not much but …’ Let me tell you something…if you think enough of me to build, buy, make, bake, paint, craft or grow something for ME…out of 7 billion people, this ONE thing is just for ME … THAT is MUCH,” the post read.
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Earlier this year, the Going There author who lost her husband and father of her two daughters, Jay Monahan to colon cancer in 1998, shared a personal essay of how she broke her cancer news to her girls: writer/director Ellie Monahan, 31, and Carrie Monahan, 26, who labels herself as a "G-List Celeb" on her comedic Instagram page.
Couric’s Experience With Breast Cancer
In the constant craziness of the past two years, Couric fessed up to the fact that she unfortunately let her regularly scheduled mammograms lapse. Life happens, but it's important not to beat yourself up. The important part is that Couric got in to get checked as soon as she did realize how much time had passed.
"Your biopsy came back. It's cancer. You're going to be fine but we need to make a plan," Couric recalled her doctor saying when breaking the news.
Her type was HER2/neu. According to the American Cancer Society, HER2 is a protein that helps breast cancer cells grow quickly. Breast cancer cells with higher than normal levels of HER2 are called HER2-positive.
Dr. Elizabeth Comen explains what HER2-positive breast cancer is and how it is treated.
In her personal essay, the mother-of-two shares a play-by-play account of the emotional experience, explaining that after undergoing a lumpectomy and radiation she thankfully made it through and is doing just fine. But that does not take away the weight of the news and what this means for her future risk, not to mention the risk for her daughters.
Until now, Couric had no family history of breast cancer. Couric has to face the fact that her daughters are now at higher risk for developing the disease.
Self-described as "borderline neurotic" about her health, and given the fact that the former TODAY anchor is known as the "screen queen" of colorectal cancer for all of her advocacy work (including having been one of the first to get a colonoscopy on camera in 2000), she is using her own example to show exactly why it is so important to get regular mammograms (and keep up with all cancer screenings).
Couric thankfully caught her cancer early at stage 1A, but if it was a different type, or if she had waited any longer, her treatment and staging could have been a different story.
Living With Gratitude After Cancer
Many cancer survivors come away from the experience with a new outlook on life, which could be a profound sense of gratitude (similar to the one Couric has been expressing). However, experts tell us anecdotally that patients who have a sense of gratitude throughout the whole experience tend to handle treatment better as well.
“The patients who do well with cancer, they live life with that kind of gratitude, but in terms of everything,” Dr. Zuri Murrell, a colorectal cancer surgeon at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, told SurvivorNet. “They’re grateful not for cancer but they’re grateful for an opportunity to know that life is finite … they appreciate it for one of the first times ever because they know it may not be forever that they get to do this.
Dr. Zuri Murrell shares his experience with patients who live with a sense of gratitude.
“Those are the patients that tend to do well with processing and also living a long, long life despite a diagnosis of, like, metastatic colon cancer disease,” he added.
Contributing: SurvivorNet Staff
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