Thyroid Cancer Survivor - Marlene's Story

Marlene is a 31 year thyroid cancer survivor. In this video she tells us how she found out she had cancer.

Marlene Johnson Cancer Survivor - 31 Years In 1976, my mother called me up and told me that she was watching Marcus Welby, and on the TV, she like said if you know anybody who has had radiation treatments, they will find out whether it could cause cancer and my mother realized that when I was little, I had enlarged Thalamus and back then they gave me radiation treatments and I had four treatments, and they said it could cause cancer. And I had no signs of cancer, no lump, nothing. But I was going up for a wedding, in June, so I said well I will just go up there and get checked and when they did check it; they found a little nodule on my thyroid. And I had been scheduled for August to get operated on, I went - came back and got operated on, and when I went in the first time, they said it wasn't cancerous and then when they went and sliced it, they found out that it was cancerous and so they went back in and they had to go in and remove my thyroid and my parathyroids. Now I am on medication. I have been on Synthroid and Vitamin D, and Calcium. And throughout the 31 years, I have had to regulate because of your hormones and everything else, you have to regulate it. I am just happy to be here, and thank God my mother watched TV and she found out about it and I am a survivor and I am just very happy to be here.