I first called all the banks that hired me to sell their 100+ foreclosures and thanked them for the opportunity, but I informed them that I needed to give all the business back. I needed to focus on my health and beating cancer. That was beginning of January 2012.
I then contacted Jonny Imerman from Imerman Angels (for those of you who do not know this organization, it’s a one on one cancer support organization where they match cancer patients with cancer survivors and do their very best to match it as identical as possible). Jonny came over immediately to talk to me about my cancer and got my plan in place. I met with three oncologists from three different top hospitals as well as spoke to a fourth over the phone. There was not one doctor who said the same as the other doctor and at the end, I decided to do what I felt was most comfortable, which was to get a double mastectomy. I wanted to cut the cancer out immediately then do the chemo to kill any potential cells that may have not been removed from the surgery. I also came up with my own “chemo cocktail” as I did not want to develop a very bad heart condition that mother did during her treatment.
That was an interesting time as I experienced every major side effect under the sun from having an allergic reaction to the Neulasta shot to developing Sweet Syndrome (which, btw, is NOT so sweet!) I was in the emergency room for quite some time. I wanted to have another child but when I spoke to the Oncologist, they told me that the chemo would age my eggs about 5 years, and I was already 40 so the chances of me having another child after chemo was slim to none. I learned the best bet was to harvest my eggs prior to chemo and save them for when I was better. Well, after going through a month’s worth of IVF hell trying to harvest my eggs, I was unsuccessful. There were a couple of attempts, but they said I had no eggs left. To hear the not so good news was difficult, as I had to initially hold off on chemo for about a month or so just to attempt all of this.
I remember when I started my chemo, they said that it would take anywhere from 14-17 days for my hair to fall out and I will tell you, that was one of the hardest things to accept. Not only did I like my long hair, but as a working professional I certainly couldn’t work bald looking so sick. So, I ended up getting a wig, not ideal in the summer. It was like wearing a wool hat, but it was in the middle of summer. It certainly was a very dark time for me that whole first half of 2012, but fortunately through my wonderful family and friends, I got a lot of help and support and got through it. Of course, I HAD to fight to get better for my baby who was not even one year old.
That year in 2012 I actually had my BEST year in real estate selling over $20M by myself with no help because my team quit on me when they found out I had breast cancer. I believe it attributed to the fact that I only felt well for a very short time every day and during that time, I made the most of it with working and was laser focused on what I needed to do!