Hope After A Metastatic Diagnosis
- SARA DIESBURG
- Jun 11
- 2 min read
Updated: Jul 27
This article is an update to the April 2022 article “Hope After a MetastaticDiagnosis.” This is a feel good story for me. I was diagnosed with Stage 2 triple negative breast cancer (TNBC) in the summer of 2015, just two years after moving back to Iowa to start my faculty job at UNI. I was 33 years old at the time and had never had a mammogram. I also had no family history of breast cancer. I successfully completed treatment, which consisted of chemotherapy, a lumpectomy, and radiation. I had obtained a pathological complete
response (PCR) at the time, which meant they saw no more cancer on any scans or the margins around the removed tissue. Unfortunately, my cancer recurred into stage 4 metastatic disease in March of 2020, when I was 37 years old and pregnant with my daughter. We discovered it came back when I had a seizure. The cancer had spread to a spot in my brain, a spot in my lung, and a lymph node. After giving birth to a healthy baby girl in April, I started stage 4 treatment consisting of a combination of immunotherapy, chemotherapy, and some pinpoint radiation. The life expectancy for someone in that situation was 2-3 years at the time. The last article talked about changes I made to my diet,
exercise, and stress to help the treatments do their work. I had too much to live for with my young family, and I didn’t want to give up. At the time of me writing my last article, I was happy to report that I had “No Evidence of Disease” (NED) status and was living a normal life with monthly immunotherapy infusions.
A few updates have happened since that time. My scans continued to be clear of cancer, and through working with my Mayo oncologists, we stopped all cancer treatments in November of 2023. My scans continue to be clear. In lieu of some scans, I am now taking a blood test every 3 months, called Signatera, that can test levels of cancer DNA fragments circulating in my blood. These tests have wonderfully come back negative, finding no cancer DNA. These tests are new and are much easier than scans. I want people to know that there are people who continue to survive a metastatic diagnosis. Statistics do not always determine fate.
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