Singer Sam McClymont, 38, Says the Hardest Part of Facing Aggressive Breast Cancer is Feeling Like She Can’t Be the Mom & Wife She Wants to Be

 

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Sam is part of a country music group. Alongside her sisters Brooke and Mollie, they’ve produced songs like “Don’t Wish It All Away,” “Here’s to You and I,” and “Forever Begins Tonight.”

For Sam, the last few months have been a whirlwind as she’s adjusted to living with the disease.

Triple-negative breast cancer means your cancer is not fueled by any of the three main types of receptors — estrogen, progesterone, or the HER2 protein. Because of this, the cancer won’t respond to certain targeted therapies, including hormone therapy or HER2-targeted agents like Herceptin. Chemotherapy is typically the treatment, and there are several options.

WATCH: Treating triple-negative breast cancer.

If the triple-negative breast cancer patient does not have many symptoms, oral chemotherapy like Xeloda (generic name: capecitabine) may be prescribed. If the patient becomes resistant to the oral chemo drug, IV (intravenous) chemotherapy may be offered weekly or bi-weekly.

McClymont shared how undergoing treatment has impacted her life.

“Last October, I found a lump. After initially being misdiagnosed, my life completely turned upside down four months later when I was diagnosed with triple-negative breast cancer at 38 years old,” McClymont wrote.

“The world stopped suddenly, and everything that we thought 2024 would be came crashing to an almighty halt. Triple-negative breast cancer is the most aggressive form,” McClymont continued.

She described how her day-to-day life has evolved while raising a family and being a cancer patient.

“It has become my full-time job having treatment. It has begun with chemotherapy/immunotherapy, which in total will be five months, followed by surgery and then radiation,” McClymont explained.

“Sometimes, it feels like Groundhog Day when I find myself back at the hospital for my weekly chemo, blood tests, and shots,” she continued.

Throughout the intensity of her journey, McClymont said her friends and family have been extremely supportive, which makes a massive difference while undergoing the rigors of treatment.

“I know I will come out the other side of this, but it’s one step at a time,” McClymont added.

Her sister Brooke commented on Instagram, “You always my beautiful sister.”

Understanding Samantha’s Breast Cancer Diagnosis

Triple-negative breast cancer is one of the most aggressive forms of the disease and accounts for about 20 percent of all breast cancers. The treatment approach varies from patient to patient and may include a combination of different treatments.

Early-stage triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC) treatments may use a combination of chemotherapy drugs.

For example, a CMF regimen is an abbreviation for combining chemotherapy drugs cyclophosphamide, methotrexate, and fluorouracil. AC stands for doxorubicin (Adriamycin) with cyclophosphamide, and ACT just indicates that a taxane drug is added to the regimen. Likewise, TC is an abbreviation for a regimen of Taxotere and cyclophosphamide.

In 2021, the FDA approved the immunotherapy drug pembrolizumab for the treatment of early-stage triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC). Pembrolizumab (Keytruda) is already used to treat other cancers, including melanoma and non-small cell lung cancer. Doctors heralded the FDA’s approval of pembrolizumab as a potentially paradigm-shifting advancement in breast cancer treatment.

For patients with stage 2 or 3 TNBC, adding the immune-boosting medication pembrolizumab to combination chemotherapy before surgery increases chances of living free of breast cancer, explains oncologist Dr. Sylvia Adams, director of the Breast Cancer Center at NYU Langone’s Perlmutter Cancer Center.

She was one of several researchers involved with the pembrolizumab trials. “It changes the standard of care and should be discussed with all patients diagnosed with stage 2-3 TNBC,” she adds. “Yes, it’s a game-changer, though there is much more to be learned.”

Immunotherapy for Triple-Negative Breast Cancer

The immune system works by using white blood cells to attack cells in the body that are abnormal or foreign. Cancer cells can stop the immune system from working like it should because they produce certain proteins that protect the tumor from white blood cells. As a result, the body does not recognize the cancerous tumor as abnormal.

Immunotherapy stops this process by ensuring white blood cells recognize and attack cancer cells.

WATCH: Immunotherapy for Triple-Negative Breast Cancer

Keytruda (Pembrolizumab) is a form of immunotherapy called a checkpoint inhibitor. Checkpoint inhibitors specifically target proteins found on immune or cancer cells to prevent their binding. The advantage of checkpoint inhibitors in treating cancer is that they don’t kill cancer cells directly, but they stimulate the immune system to find the cancer cells and attack them while hopefully not affecting other surrounding healthy cells.

Checkpoint inhibitors work on the background knowledge that the immune system can protect our bodies by eliminating any foreign cells that aren’t produced in the body. It sets out to do this by identifying specific proteins (also known as checkpoint proteins) that are only found on normal cells; when it finds them, it binds to this cell to mark it as safe and leaves it be.

However, sometimes cancer cells can trick the immune system by displaying these same proteins, binding to the immune cells, switching them off, and starting to divide and reproduce, which manifests in the onset of cancer.

Nevertheless, checkpoint inhibitors can help by specifically targeting proteins found on normal or cancer cells to prevent this binding and keep the immune cells alert to any foreign cells so that they can find and stop cancer cells.

Known side effects for Keytruda include:

• Feeling tired (fatigue)
• Rash
• Cough and shortness of breath
• Decreased appetite
• Itching
• Low levels of thyroid hormone.
• Nausea and vomiting
• Diarrhea or constipation
• Abdominal pain

Questions to Ask Your Doctor

If you have been diagnosed with breast cancer, you may have questions about how to keep your strength through treatment. Here are a few questions to help you begin the conversation:

• What treatment will I be receiving?
• What side effects are associated with this treatment?
• Are there steps I can take daily to help minimize these side effects?
• What physical activity routine do you recommend for me during treatment?
• Do you have recommendations for someone who doesn’t particularly enjoy exercise?

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