Think Pink: Surviving Infertility and Breast Cancer

You’d have to be living under a rock to miss Breast Cancer Awareness Month this year. From the White House to DVDs, jeans, chicken and even local courthouses, everyone is sporting pink. Even the courthouse in my burg of Chesapeake, Virginia has embraced the raspberry wrap.

Despite all the sprays of pink all over the shelves of every store in America, I’m not moved.  No, what moves me are people who’ve actually battled cancer and survived, people like my friend Susan (aka WhyMommy) who is fighting her second bout with breast cancer.  All across America, women just like Susan are quietly kicking cancer’s butt and taking names.

Then I saw this wonderful story of inspiration and an unusual intersection of fertility and breast cancer.  We’ve all seen quite a bit in the news about women and men working to preserve their fertility before going through cancer treatments. But Rebecca and Larry Byrne struggled to conceive and finally got pregnant through IVF and then discovered that Rebecca had breast cancer. She was 13 weeks pregnant at the time of her diagnosis. Despite the odds, Rebecca gave birth to a little girl after going through two surgeries and beginning chemotherapy while pregnant. You can check out her blog, myboobsandmybaby.blogspot.com, here.

I can’t imagine having to make such a decision, but I was so happy to find that, so far, this IVF story has a happy ending. I’ll be rooting for Rebecca and her family during her battle with breast cancer and I hope you will too.