Amanda was in her sixth month of pregnancy, feeling healthy and strong and maintaining her usual routine of running and biking. At 36 years old, she was considered an advanced age for pregnancy, so her doctors recommended genetic screening for the baby. The initial results suggested trisomy 13, a rare chromosome abnormality in the baby. Babies with this abnormality don’t typically live longer than a week and have severe medical issues. For a week, Amanda and her husband grappled with the potential that they might lose their child.
Because of cancer research, I am still running marathons and caring for my son. Without investment in research, none of that would be possible.
But a follow-up test showed that the baby was healthy. Amanda was told that sometimes, cancer cells in women can cause false positives in genetic screening tests. Because Amanda had been diagnosed with stage IA malignant melanoma a few years ago after having a mole removed, her doctors ordered further testing. She went in for a mole check and nothing concerning showed up. To be extra cautious, the clinic ordered an MRI, which detected tumors on Amanda’s liver.
In May of 2021, at 31 weeks pregnant, Amanda was diagnosed with stage 4 colon cancer. Her doctors told her that in some ways, her pregnancy saved her life by allowing them to find the cancer when they did. Due to the stage of her pregnancy, she was able to undergo the same cancer treatment plan that she would have if she hadn’t been pregnant.
She received her first three chemotherapy treatments while in the hospital under the care of staff who monitored the baby. She then had a C-section to deliver her son at 37 weeks. Three weeks later, she had five more rounds of chemotherapy and then surgery, which removed the entire right lobe of her liver and 20% of her colon. She then underwent five more rounds of chemotherapy.
Four weeks after her treatment ended, Amanda was back to training for a marathon. She is grateful for her son and for the care she received that has led her to be in remission. She knows she might not be here today if it weren’t for the continued investment in cancer research over the years, which made it possible for her doctors to find and treat her cancer quickly.