VIDEO TRANSCRIPT: THIS TRANSCRIPT WAS GENERATED USING AN AUTOMATED SERVICE SO WE APOLOGIZE FOR ANY TYPOS AND SPELLING ERRORS.

This is my part of my story

[00:00:00] So it's Wednesday, June 17th, and this is the four year anniversary of the day that I was diagnosed with ovarian cancer. Now my friends and family sometimes get annoyed when I say that I'm glad I had it and I get it. It sucked. Probably worse for them than it sucked for me for many reasons. Like I always say Selfly, I don't wanna see anyone I know and love go through cancer, not selflessly. 

Like I'll take it away from them like selfishly, like I can handle myself. I don't wanna have to take care of you or anyone else. So I am sorry to my friends and family for what they had to withstand because my friends, my family, my patients might. Partners, like the people were amazing. That said, this is my journey and I'm actually glad I went through it. 

So I wanna talk about why and I wanna talk about the signs and symptoms of ovarian cancer cuz you gotta know them. And as always, I'm wanna try to decrease the fear. I'm gonna give you a trigger warning. Some of the things I'm gonna talk about are kind of [00:01:00] explicit because what I went through was. Easy. 

And I say that proudly because I want to show you guys that you may go through a lot of shit in your lives going forward. You may be going through it right now. You may have a family member who's going through it. It might come in 10 years, but that doesn't mean that when you go through really bad things, even with complications, that we'll discuss that it's gonna end in death and destruction and ion. 

So let me also preface this whole thing by saying I am deeply, um, always grateful that I did get through this. And I am keenly aware of the fact that people do not get through this. And I am always sad and mindful for those people themselves, their families, um, and their friends who had to go through it because I just feel lucky. 

I don't think I was, you know, like chosen because of anything other than just. And maybe things like being proactive and finding it [00:02:00] early. So that's what we're gonna talk about. So first and foremost, the very basics. Finding ovarian cancer is not easy because, let me reiterate. The dogs are crying. Sorry, that it is not screened for ovarian cancer. 

Has no screening test. Let me repeat. No screening test. The pap smear doesn't find it. When you go to your gynecologist and she puts her hand into your vagina and pushes on your pelvis, that's basically it. And it is not a good screening test for ovarian cancer because your ovaries would have to be incredibly enlarged for her to feel them. 

So how would you. Well, first of all, let's talk about how is it typically found. It's typically found stage three or four, 66% or more are found at stage three or four, which is not great, obviously. So if we can find it early, it is actually highly survivable. You will hear words like ovarian cancer is the silent killer. 

It's not silent, as I always say, it's subtle, so you have to know the signs and symptoms and we're gonna keep talking about them. The signs and symptoms [00:03:00] are subtle. Are persistent and are common, and that means that each time you feel them, you have to kind of think about it, but you have to do it without being paranoid because the vast majority of times when you do have those signs and symptoms, it will not be ovarian cancer. 

Okay, so let's just think about this again, really common symptom. , most likely not ovarian cancer, but always appropriate to get them checked out. One of my many isms and paradigms when someone has a complaint is, I will say, it's likely nothing, but let's get it checked out, because that kind of encompasses everything. 

It decreases the anxiety and fear because that's never gonna help us, but it doesn't ignore things because ignoring things is also never going to help us. So the signs and symptoms, unfortunately, again, common. Common would be things like, Bloating. You know, I kind of always point to this area when I say to my patients, if you have bloating, pain, or pressure, and it lasts more than two weeks. 

Then just get it checked out. [00:04:00] Meaning if you said, I just had a glass of wine last night, and I don't usually drink wine and I'm really bloated, all right, that's gonna last a day or two, that should go away. But if it's been two straight weeks of you feeling really bloated, a lot of pressure in your pelvis, a lot of new onset, lower back pain that feels like it's pushing into your pelvis. 

A lot of new onset urinary symptoms like pressure when you pee, feeling like you have to pee without it being a uti, a change in your bowel movements, any of those things should prompt you to. I'm probably fine, but let me go see my doctor and my doctor should do a pelvic ultrasound and potentially talk about going to see a gastroenterologist because there is an overlap between the signs and symptoms of colon cancer and ovarian cancer. 

So again, bloating, pain, pressure, lasting more than two weeks. Please don't do what millions of women do, which is, ah, I ate too much Chinese food. I had too much wine. You know, I haven't been exercising. It must just be perimenopause. Those are actually all. [00:05:00] Possibly the truth, but we don't know that and we can't prove that it is any of those. 

We can only disprove things like something growing in your ovaries. So please, if those things happen, be proactive, not paranoid. It's been two weeks. That crazy doctor with a little short blonde hair keeps saying that I should go get checked out. Go see your doctor and if your doctor says, no, I think you're fine. 

Wait another couple. Either wait, but make sure that you follow through or ask for a pelvic ultrasound. Now, here's the problem with pelvic ultrasounds. They are not foolproof either. There are a lot of what we call false positives, meaning you get an ultrasound. You might have a cyst. It's likely not ovarian cancer, but now you have to follow up again and you might be annoyed cuz you think, why do I have to follow up again? 

It's probably not ovarian cancer. My insurance company might not even cover this because it's not a screening test. Why is my doctor sending me? Is she just covering her ass? The answer to all those is, Yes. No, no, no, no. Meaning I don't think she's covering her ass. I think she's doing the right thing and I hope she's doing the right thing because you should have a pelvic ultrasound if you have those symptoms. 

[00:06:00] Is insurance gonna cover it? It might not. That sucks. You should lobby and you should go talk to your insurance companies and your congresspeople because there is no screening test for ovarian cancer. That is no one's fault. That is just because the ovaries are deep inside our pelvis. They are hard to find. 

There's no test that can. Scrape them or swab them. And an ultrasound unfortunately, is not a great screening test because it can't be done easily across the country. There's a lot of stipulations to qualify as a screening test and the interval at which it's considered safe, meaning, I have an option today, it's normal. 

Three months from now, is it still gonna be normal? We don't know. Unlike a mammogram, which you can do year. A yearly ultrasound is not enough. So again, it is not a screening test. It is not your doctor's fault because it's not a screening test. Many high deductible insurance companies might not cover it. 

That is your insurance company's fault, and our politicians who are not lobbying for us. So go ahead and talk to your politicians. Is it again, something that's necessary? Yes. Will there be a huge [00:07:00] number of ultrasounds that will likely yield normal results or benign results that need to be followed up on? 

Recurrent cysts. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. But if we are not proactive and send patients for ultrasounds, and as patients go talk to our doctor and ask for an ultrasound, we will not find the stage one and twos like me. So I was stage two, which means my likelihood of survival. Is far higher than if I was found at stage four. 

My situation was a little bit different because mine came from endometriosis. So while I was like writhing in pain and in child's pose, even though as I joke I'm don't do yoga, I would say to myself, ah, this is just my periods coming back as I'm in my forties. I was 46. It's just because I had endometriosis, but I finally. 

After not too long. What I would tell you to do if you came in with me with pain, I would say it's likely nothing but you have to do an ultrasound. Do I really have to do an ultrasound? Well, yeah, cuz if you, God forbid, have something, you wanna find it early. So I did an ultrasound, my [00:08:00] amazing ultrasound text said, looks a little funky, probably an endometrioma. 

I know that you would make your patient do an mri, so you're gonna do the same thing. Right. And of course I was like, yeah, I mean, I'll do it just to put my money where my mouth is, but I know it's. And I did the MRI and the amazing radiologist called me and said, this looks abnormal. And I said, I think it's okay. 

I think it's just an endometrioma, but I'm in so much pain. I will get it. My re removed, here's where I'm gonna give you the trigger warning. Don't watch if you don't wanna hear some gory details. So I have an mri. It looks funky like an endometrioma, but maybe irregular. We weren't sure. We thought it probably wasn't cancer, but we were open to the possibility. 

So my amazing GYN oncology surgeon, Who I revere, who is just smart and bright and great hands and very well trained, and I say all that because I had my surgery, it turned out that it was ovarian cancer. It was a pretty extensive surgery, meaning uterus, ovaries, tubes. Mentum, which is that fatty apron of tissue.[00:09:00]  

Um, and lymph nodes all had to be removed, sent to the lab so that they could decide that yes, it's ovarian cancer and what kind and what stage. And as it turns out, it was stage two because I had had surgeries in the past because I had scar tissue with endometriosis there ended up being a small, teeny hole in my bladder that was not initially detected because it was so small and it took a couple of days. 

And very compulsive doctors and me being in the. With a lot of gross pain and a lot of things happening to find out that my bladder was perforated, so there was a hole in my bladder. I had to have a second surgery, a big up and down incision, and then that incision, because I then had to go through chemotherapy, decided that it wanted to open up. 

So I had another great team of people, wound care people, acupuncturist. Wound care, um, rep all people, general surgeon, people taking care of my wound, um, along with my oncologist. So I had a great team of people. I was lucky that, of course I understand this stuff and I could advocate for myself. I tell you these things, [00:10:00] not so that you feel like Shiva, because Shiva is fine. 

I tell you because if any of you are embarking on surgery or you hear any of this news, here's what I want you to. Cancer happens and it sucks. You might have seen my previous post today. It sucks ass and it's annoying and it's frustrating and it's painful and it's sad and it's emotional and it leaves awake so, Of death, but for the most part, it leaves a wake of ripples That can be terrible or good. 

So if you find it early, your likelihood of doing okay is very high. That doesn't mean you're not still gonna go shoot through a lot of crap. So bladder perforation, wound separation, six months of chemo. Try to keep my hair with this thing called a cold cap. It didn't work. I lost my hair. So all that stuff. 

I'm still here four years later feeling really good. So I say this to you so that you realize I will never promise you a rose garden. I am not gonna sit here and be like, okay, y'all we're y'all new. Have a good life from living into our nineties and nothing's [00:11:00] gonna happen. I'm actually gonna say the opposite. 

I'm gonna say, statistically speaking, we're gonna live into our eighties or nineties. Shit is gonna happen. You might as well just accept that. Like I say that to my kids, I mean that might sound crazy, but I do. I'd rather be prepared and say, not in an ominous, negative way, stuff is gonna happen. But my part, my role in this medically finding things as early as I can. 

And being as aggressive as I can to fix them emotionally, acknowledging that shit's gonna happen. But if I am proactive and I keep my mind in it, my ultimate goal is that I'm gonna survive. And if I'm gonna survive, that's all I care about. All the shit between now and the end of survival, it's all just a part of my story. 

Okay, so. All this to say, please be proactive with your health, whether it's your ovaries, your colon, your cervix, your breasts, your skin, your brain, anything. Please play the mindset game. Remind yourself the vast majority of us on this earth, Are going to survive into our eighties and nineties. And I would also [00:12:00] offer this if we're not gonna survive, if, God forbid we've been diagnosed with something young, or a family member has been diagnosed with something young, and the ultimate is that we do not survive past a couple of years or months. 

That makes me sad for the people I know who have gone through it and are going through it. I would still say having a positive mindset, not a fake, like, oh, everything's gonna be okay. Finding the good within the crap. I always say we need to find the the really sweet parts within it. I had a million sweet parts, my patience, my friends, people I didn't know. 

There were prayer chains, there were cards. There was so much love and juju and I felt it. And I hope that none of you ever have to go through. To know how much you're loved, but know that you are loved and know that you can get through many things and those things that we can't get through, that we can't control. 

We still have to approach with a mindset of [00:13:00] not feeling death and despair because that's never gonna help us. You've heard me say never in the history of ever has freaking out, been be. Okay. All right. If you got through to the end of this, kudos to you. I love you all. I'm gonna go do rounds at the hospital. 

I'm gonna try to do some interviews today with some people who have had ovarian cancer so you can hear more stories. I love you all truly, and I'm sending you all juju.