Anita’s Journey: A Story of Cervical Cancer Awareness and Self-Care

At Women’s Health, we respect everyone’s privacy. That is why only a first name is mentioned in this story.

At the end of 2020, Anita was home for the holidays. She lived in Norway at the time. “I had the feeling that something wasn’t quite right. I had no complaints or pain, but I literally and figuratively had a gut feeling’, she says. Anita mustered up all her courage and decided to sound the alarm. She tells her story to Women’s Health.

Not a good gut feeling

‘I had a very busy life, because I had set up my own tourism company in Norway. Everything was down due to COVID, so I suddenly had a little more time. As I mentioned, I had a gut feeling. At the end of January 2021, I therefore decided to call the doctor in Norway after all.’ In mid-February, Anita was able to get a pap smear. ‘I had blood loss immediately after the smear test, which actually confirmed to me that something was not right.’

Examine result

After four weeks, Anita got a result. ‘The GP’s assistant called me, she immediately told me what it was. ‘The result is not good. You have to go to the hospital because you have HPV type 16.’ After a few weeks of uncertainty and fear, Anita ended up at a specialist hospital in Norway. Here a small operation was done and some tissue was removed. ‘After all the tests, a female gynecologist came to see me. She asked me if I still had children. I immediately said: ‘I don’t have that, why?’ The gynecologist told me that she was 99% sure that I had cancer, so she wanted to suggest taking everything out preventively.’ Anita didn’t have to think about that. ‘I had a daughter at a young age, so I didn’t need any more children. I immediately told her to take everything out.’

Operation

On May 19, 2021, Anita received confirmation that it was indeed cervical cancer. Fortunately, all the scans that followed showed that she had no metastases. ‘I had surgery on June 16. What was special was that immediately after the operation my gut feeling disappeared. I was in a rag basket, but I’ve never felt so healthy.’ After the operation, Anita suffered from lymphedema, an accumulation of lymphatic fluid in her legs, which still bothers her to this day. ‘Unfortunately it is not the case that you have an operation and that everything is fine afterwards. I’ll have to live with this.’ In addition to these complaints, Anita also left a large scar from the operation. ‘I always say now: I don’t have one smiley face but one smiley bellybecause at the bottom of my abdomen there is now a scar of about 22 centimeters.’

Guilt towards herself

Still, after her surgery, Anita struggled with a sense of guilt towards herself. ‘I was not healthy. My work demanded too much of me and I was under a lot of stress. I gave my tourists an unforgettable holiday, in the best sense of the word, but I neglected myself so much.’ Anita now manages to put a positive spin on the situation: ‘It means so much to me that I stood up for myself. I went through the whole journey on my own and I took the time to take care of myself. It’s a pity it took this, but I’ve never loved myself as much in my life as I do now.’

At Women’s Health we do not give advice and we only provide you with information. If you have a question about your personal situation, please consult a doctor. For the most recent developments in the field of HPV, you can visit the site of the RIVM.