I Had Early Onset Cancer. It Triggered the Menopause at 37

When my children were little, I was a very active mom.

During nap time, I’d push my baby, Freddie, in a Bob stroller as I ran the woodland trails behind my house. I spent hours on the trampoline with my three-year-old, Max. I taught him how to do somersaults, seat drops, and high ninja kicks.

“Higher, Mommy!” he’d shriek as I double-bounced him up into the air.

But all this changed after I was treated for early-onset breast cancer and experienced induced menopause at 37 years old.

In October 2017, when Max was three years old, and Freddie was 18 months old, I found a lump: Small and hard, sitting just above my right breast.

At first, I thought it was something left over from nursing. Thankfully, the next day, I followed up with my primary care doctor who sent me in for a mammogram.

Suddenly, I became one of the 250,000 women living in the United States diagnosed with breast cancer under the age of 40.

After the biopsy and the unilateral mastectomy, I met with my oncologist to discuss treatment options. As a young mother, I was prepared to do anything and everything I could to make sure the cancer never came back.

He prescribed me ten years of adjuvant endocrine therapy, widely used to treat hormone-sensitive breast cancer in lieu of chemotherapy. These hormone medications wiped out all the estrogen in my body, shut down my ovaries, and pushed me into premature induced menopause.

Within weeks of starting the meds, I felt like I’d aged 20 years. My energy levels plummeted, and my moods were all over the place. My hair thinned—I’d find clumps of blonde strands in the shower drain at my feet—and I gained five pounds in my midsection.

I also experienced severe brain fog, where I’d suddenly lose my train of thought and couldn’t finish a sentence. On one occasion, I took Freddie to the supermarket and found myself wandering aimlessly through the store. I couldn’t remember what I’d gone there for.

As Freddie stared at me inquisitively from the shopping cart, I thought: Why had we come here? Why couldn’t I remember anything? What was wrong with me?

Another time, Max challenged me to a game of Memory and he was delighted by my inability to make a single match. My mind felt like it was stuffed with cotton balls.

Frustrated at how bad my recall had become, I quit mid-game and launched into a rant about how “intelligence is measured in many different ways!”

I used to remember every minute detail from an article I read or a movie I watched. Now, at 37 years old, I’d routinely forget where I parked my car in the parking garage. Suddenly, I felt old.

“Anna, be sure to have kids when you’re young,” my mother once told me.

When she offered me this advice, I was in my mid-twenties and trying to survive in Manhattan on an entry-level salary. I could barely keep a plant alive, let alone a baby.

“Mom!” I laughed. “Stop. I don’t even have a serious boyfriend.”

“Well then find one!” she said half-joking. “Just don’t wait too long. It’s exhausting.”

One year before Freddie was born, my mother passed away from stage four bone cancer.

I am very grateful she got to experience being a grandmother, to Max, for a short time. She was there for me during the difficult first weeks postpartum and helped me through the sleepless newborn stage.

Two weeks before she entered at-home hospice, she hosted Max’s first birthday party. My mom was always the life of the party. Even a terminal cancer diagnosis couldn’t slow her down.

The hardest thing about my own cancer diagnosis and treatment was not being able to talk to my mom about it. I had no idea what to expect—physically or emotionally— in menopause.

There were so many questions I wanted to ask her, like: What supplements should I take for the brain fog? Did you have hot flashes, too?

I couldn’t confide in my friends about what I was going through because none of them had been through it, yet. My peers were still young, healthy, and vibrant. Many of them were still trying to conceive, while I was no longer having a period.

Of course, they could understand intellectually what I was going through, and offer support, but I was in a different camp.

After an article I wrote about medical menopausal went viral, I started connecting online with a group of survivors like me who had been pushed into induced menopause for different reasons including cancer treatments—chemotherapy, radiation, and hormone medications—as well as surgeries like hysterectomy or oophorectomy.

One woman suggested Ginkgo Biloba for memory loss, and another told me that Holy Basil tea helps with hot flashes. We were all in the same boat: Young moms in menopause, who were also trying to chase a toddler around the house.

When I first became a mom, I longed for a supportive community of mothers. I signed up for a Mommy and Me music class and was lucky to meet six other women who were in the same stage of life as I was.

We shared sleep training tips and went to the park together. But when I got cancer and was launched into menopause, I had no community.

Eventually, I built friendships with other women who were experiencing induced menopause, and I felt a lot less alone. I also connected with women in natural menopause, many of whom were much older than me, and I learned how important it is to have friends and mentors of all ages.

Now, six years later, I’m still in treatment, and I’m still in menopause. I tire easily and my joints and muscles chronically ache. I can’t push myself physically the way I used to when I was younger.

I’m not the same person, or mother, I once was. I’ve learned to accept that. After all, our bodies will only continue to change with time—if we’re lucky.

More than anything, I’m thankful my cancer diagnosis was at an early stage and that it was treatable. I’m grateful I had my two children before my diagnosis.

Over the years, I met many survivors who had to face family planning and complicated fertility issues on top of everything else. These brave young women were navigating all the what-ifs of young adulthood, while also trying to survive a cancer diagnosis.

These days, my favorite activities include watching movies and reading books with my children. They love to collect all the blankets and pillows from around the house and make a fort in my oversized bed. I like to think I’ve taught them that it’s okay to slow down.

But every now and then, I’ll climb back on the trampoline with my kids. “Higher, Mommy!” they yell. They delight in having me jump with them. And I love it, too. For a moment my body feels weightless.

It’s like time stops, and we’re flying together.

Anna Sullivan is a mental health therapist and author. She is writing a book about surviving breast cancer and going through premature induced menopause at 37 years old.

All views expressed are the author’s own.

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