NEED TO KNOW
Irene Sinsombutcharoen sought emergency treatment after worsening pain left her bedridden for several days.
Doctors diagnosed her with stage 1 ovarian cancer and she kept one ovary to preserve her chances of having children.
Now in remission, she uses TikTok to encourage women to seek more help when symptoms persist
Irene Sinsombutcharoen was on a cruise in May 2022 when she first noticed that her belly was swollen and heavier than usual.
“I wasn’t able to walk normally,” Sinsombutcharoen, 34, shares with PEOPLE. “I was wobbling all day and I even remember feeling all the bumps on the golf cart we took and on the boat.”
Yet while exploring Santa Catalina Island in California, she didn’t feel mild discomfort, but rather a stabbing pain.
“I remember all the pain I felt that day; I was like, ‘I’ve never felt this pain before.’ That’s how I knew something was definitely wrong,” she shares. “After we got off the golf cart, I separated from my friends and I remember thinking, ‘I can’t go anymore.’ I got back on the cruise ship and laid down.”
Sinsombutcharoen fell asleep, but the pain returned the next day. During the week-long cruise, Sinsombutcharoen says she found herself stuck in bed for about five days because of the pain.
Irene Sinsombutcharoen in a garden
Credit: Irene Sinsombutcharoen
After the trip, she asked her friends if they had ever experienced similar symptoms, but they suggested that maybe she had IBS or had simply eaten something out of the ordinary.
“For a month, I was trying to see if it was something I was eating. Then finally, in June, that’s when I went to the doctor for the first time,” Sinsombutcharoen said.
“One time I went to the doctor, he said, ‘Oh, I think you need to lose weight or it might be more of a gastrointestinal issue. Maybe you just have gas,'” she recalled. “He did a blood test. When I came back to get my results – just blood results, which literally took two minutes – it cost me another $100.”
Still, Sinsombutcharoen “knew it wasn’t a gastrointestinal problem” because she started feeling “a bump in her stomach.” Regardless, her doctor kept telling her the “next step” was to see a GI doctor.
“I already had a feeling it wouldn’t just be my stomach,” shares Sinsombutcharoen.
Irene Sinsombutcharoen in the flower fields
Credit: Irene Sinsombutcharoen
Feeling dismissed, Sinsombutcharoen goes looking for a new doctor. A month later, she went to the emergency room and waited six hours to be seen.
“When I went to bed, they felt my stomach and they said, ‘Okay, this is definitely something that’s not supposed to be there.’ Then they insisted that I immediately have an ultrasound and a CT scan,” she says. “I remember that moment when they came in and they said to me, ‘Okay, you have a mass.’ And I said to myself: “A mass? Is it the same as a tumor? Then they said, “Yes.” “
“My next question right after that was, ‘Well, will I be able to have children in the future?’ Without even knowing which organ. I remember thinking right away that this might be like a reproductive part. Then they were like, ‘Well, we’ll have to see after your surgery,'” shares Sinsombutcharoen.
They scheduled an X-ray and she was assigned a gynecologic oncologist who helped her prepare for surgery. However, they found a blood clot and had to delay the operation.
“I remember from that point on, from the time I went to the emergency room until I finally had surgery, my belly was getting bigger and bigger every time, and I literally felt like I was pregnant, like eight months pregnant,” Sinsombutcharoen recalled.
Sinsombutcharoen’s doctor told her she had a month and a half to decide whether to remove just her left ovary, where the 15-pound weight is. the mass has been located, or remove both ovaries.
“The chances of it happening again are about 85 percent in the first five years. He said, ‘You should get it over with if you don’t want to have kids.’ But at this point in my life, I’m like, “I don’t have a husband.” I would love to have kids in the future, but how am I supposed to decide whether or not I want kids within a month?’” she recalls. “He told me to let him know the day of the surgery.”
When the day came, Sinsombutcharoen told them to remove only the left ovary and that she would “go from there.”
After waking up from surgery, Sinsombutcharoen was informed that it would be a few weeks before he got the results of the biopsy. She spent four days in the hospital recovering, and during that time her doctors told her it “looked even more cancerous because of all the black blood and bubbles they saw.”
Credit: Irene Sinsombutcharoen
Two weeks later, she learned of the results of the 28-centimeter mass.
“Half was borderline (cancerous) and the other half was malignant,” she told PEOPLE, noting that she was “so lucky it was only stage 1.”
“Then I also found out that because they took everything out of me, I wouldn’t have to go through chemo,” she adds. “Apparently my tumor was so strong that it started creating its own blood supply in my body and that’s why it grew so quickly in such a short time.”
Sinsombutcharoen’s doctors told her she could have had Mass for years before knowing anything.
“With ovarian cancer, you may have symptoms, but it’s very difficult to know if you have it because there is no test to detect ovarian cancer,” she explains. “When you access your CPAP, it only detects uterine cancer and other diseases. There is no specific test to detect ovarian cancer unless you go in and ask for a blood test.”
As she did not need chemotherapy, Sinsombutcharoen has been in remission since having her tumor removed. Every six months, she has blood tests to detect two cancer markers, CA-125 and CA-19-9, and undergoes a transvaginal ultrasound.
Sinsombutcharoen shared videos about her experience on her TikTok account to raise awareness about ovarian cancer and how it can go unnoticed for so long.
“I found humor as a way to cope, and I also want women to know that it’s not okay to be laid off. You have to continue to find care,” she told PEOPLE. “When you know something is wrong, because you know your body best.”
She posts a mix of “funny” and “educational” videos to “catch the attention of women around the world.”
“This cancer is a silent killer, and I think we need to get checked out if we experience symptoms of it, because the symptoms are so broad,” Sinsombutcharoen shares.
She receives many comments from women who have experienced a similar situation, as well as people who are actively undergoing treatment.
“It’s difficult because we’re obviously not doctors, but I want to give as much advice as possible,” she explains. “I would ask them, ‘Well, why don’t you at least try to get an ultrasound, because that would take things even further. Maybe they’ll see something in the ultrasound that will flag it, and maybe you can order some blood work afterward.’ “
Sinsombutcharoen notes that ovarian cancer symptoms can resemble those that women experience and feel on a daily basis, making them more difficult to identify. Before her diagnosis, when she researched her symptoms, the internet suggested she had IBS or was allergic to gluten.
“I never thought for about two months while I was waiting to see a doctor, that it was cancer. I always thought it could have been something else.”
Credit: Irene Sinsombutcharoen
Some symptoms seemed “so common” that they were easy to “ignore.”
“There’s this acronym; it’s called BEAT, for the four common signs of ovarian cancer, but they’re so broad that you would never think it could be related to cancer,” she shares. “B for bloating. E for difficulty eating, when you feel more full when you eat. A for abdominal pain, and then T for changes in urine or stools.”
For anyone undergoing treatment for ovarian cancer, she advises to “take it one day at a time.”
“Make sure you take care of yourself and your mental health, stay strong, and continue to fight for the things that — if you don’t think are right — continue to fight for the things that you finally feel comfortable with,” she says. “If they can’t find a solution, find another doctor.”
“Even with blood tests, sometimes you come in and they say, ‘Okay, we’re going to do three blood tests.’ But it’s not just three blood tests. There are about 100 that you can try,” she continues. “So if that doesn’t work, then push for more blood tests to be done, push for more tests to be done.”
Read the original article on People
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