When was dorothy hamill diagnosed with cancer

Martina Navratilova. Meghan Kinney. Diana Golden. Peggy Fleming. Photo Credit: Twitter. Shannon Miller. I'll Be Back, weAdmire. These badass women proved that…. Celebrity, weLearn. Not all athletes SLAY when it comes to fashion.

Here are some…. Power Player, weAdmire. Name Email Go. No Thanks. Subscribe to our newsletter! Now, Dorothy is opening up about her battle with a different disease — breast cancer. She has undergone a lumpectomy and radiation and is now participating in a clinical trial for an aromatase inhibitor. I get frustrated at not being able to do what I want to do on the ice.

Maybe it will get better. And I try not to wallow in them. I allow myself some quiet time and some positive time just to recoup.

Dorothy insists that her family and friends are what is most important in her life right now. Her daughter, Alexandra, was only 19 and had just begun her first year of college when her mother was diagnosed. She took time off from school to be with her mom during this difficult time. And if there is one thing Dorothy Hamill knows well, it is perseverance. I try to keep it in perspective. She would go on to star in the Ice Capades for seven years before actually owning it for a short time.

By traveling the country, appearing on television in skating specials, and showing up for interviews during many winter Olympics, Hamill has remained in the public eye, though the headlines about her that appeared a few years ago had nothing to do with skating.

Most people assume that celebrities lead a charmed, worry-free life, but no amount of fame or achievement in the name of your country can give you immunity from cancer. About five years ago, Hamill was diagnosed with breast cancer, and suddenly, like other cancer patients, her life changed. Once you get your diagnosis you have to do as best you can on your mental outlook and do your research to understand how complex cancer is. For someone who had spent the better part of her young life willing her body to achieve her dream, Hamill found herself in a struggle where she no longer controlled the outcome.

Not only did Hamill benefit from those advances, she actually volunteered to participate in a study to help future patients. Apparently there had just been a study released that showed that with the particular form of breast cancer that I had, having chemo in addition to radiation didn't affect the chance of recurrence. At this point, Hamill could have simply gotten her treatment and gone home, but she had a much more altruistic vision of how she was going to do her part to not only beat her cancer, but to help other women beat their cancer.

Hamill says that her cancer was hormone related, which is why her doctors mentioned the study. For those that don't know, aromatase is the enzyme that synthesizes estrogen. Studies have shown that most cases of breast cancer require estrogen to grow, so taking an aromatase inhibitor may block the production of estrogen or prevent the normal response of estrogen, thus starving the tumor.

Unfortunately, the new drugs aromatase inhibitors didn't help Hamill at all. In fact, they were making her ill. The reason aromatase inhibitor drugs make some women feel so lousy is that it deprives them of estrogen.