Christina Applegate Stands Up to Cancer

Recently I had sort of health scare, which required me to get undergo some minor surgery last week. Without getting into too many details, there were a few days where I was miserable, scared and truly pissed off about my situation. Luckily, I have a great doctor, an amazing boyfriend, a loving mom and some kick ass friends and family who have been helping me through everything. There are few things other than your loved ones that can make you feel better when you are sick. My standard go-tos are Archie comics, soup, pudding and classic films. And by classic films I mean “Valley Girl”, “Troop Beverly Hills” and “Don’t Tell Mom the Babysitters Dead”. “Don’t Tell” is truly the best comedy ever made to cheer yourself up. It has everything: hijinks, a love story, a mystery, teen angst, redemption and a cool early 90’s fashion show all rolled into one. And it stars one of my favorite comedians and actresses Christina Applegate. While I have always loved the funny blonde, her uncanny comedic timing was something that always impressed me about her. Other than her TV role as Kelly Bundy, she generally shied away from repeatedly playing the typical blonde airhead. So two weeks ago, when I found out I had to have surgery I immediately ran home, crawled in bed and turned on “Don’t Tell Mom the Babysitters Dead”.

Ironically, Christina Applegate was going through her own traumatic medical scare at the same time. Applegate, who is genetically predisposed for breast cancer, found a cancerous lump in her one of her breasts last month. She immediately let the media know about her battle and that she should be fine because they caught it so early due to Applegate’s diligent early detection efforts. Simply put, the strong ass woman decided to confront her disease head on, make no bones about it and take an amazingly strong approach to making sure it doesn’t rear its ugliness in her face again. Earlier this week, she sat down with ABC’s Good Morning America News anchor Robin Roberts, who has also battled the disease, to discuss her treatment, prognosis and where she is going next. Applegate revealed, while she had only found a lump in one breast, she decided for her health and future sanity to undergo a double mastectomy. "My decision, after looking at all the treatment plans that were possibilities for me, the only one that seemed the most logical and the one that was going to work for me was to have a bilateral mastectomy," said Applegate. Her mother, Nancy Priddy, also had a mastectomy a few years ago, after she was diagnosed with breast cancer for the second time over the course of twenty years. Applegate said it was watching her mother battle the disease that made her sure of her decision to remove both breasts.

While Applegate did she was angry, confused and pissed off about her original diagnosis, especially after the years of preemptive care she had and strict diets she adhered to, she quickly went into “take-care-of-business mode” to remove the disease and get on the road to recovery. The invasive surgery was performed three weeks ago and the cute actress is already back to her old self, cracking jokes on GMA. Currently, she has not undergone any additional efforts, such as radiation or chemotherapy, but Applegate said she is “100% cancer free”. She also poked fun at the reconstructive surgery that lies ahead of her on GMA saying “I'm gonna have cute boobs till I'm 90", with regards to her future implants.

While there is a very tough road in front of her, it looks like Christina is staying strong and sticking to what she does best – being funny. The actress was nominated for an Emmy for her starring role in Samantha Who?, which returns to ABC this Fall season. She will also appear with other celebrities on the cross channel effort TV special Stand Up to Cancer, airing Sept. 5 on all three major networks, ABC, CBS and NBC, which will raise funds for cancer research. Christina also said that she looks forward to creating programs that will raise money for MRIs and gene testing for women who might be unable to afford it, since early detection was truly the savior in this case. All in all, I know that this was beyond a difficult choice to make, but I love that this warrior, who also described her mother in a similar fashion, has been so vocal in regards to this battle and has given other women the courage to face this ugly disease. I am glad that she is cancer free and I hope that Hollywood begins to take a deeper look at this beyond talented strong woman, who should truly be a role model to all.


For more information about Christina’s battle and what you can do, check out these links:
ABC News
U.S. News & World Report
Stand Up 2 Cancer
Susan G. Komen For the Cure
USA Today
Images Courtesy of Reuters