To mark National Surrogacy Week, a mum-of-four has shared how surrogacy helped her achieve her dream of becoming a mum after a breast cancer diagnosis and heart failure caused by chemo that made her infertile
Being told that you have breast cancer is an extreme life-altering moment and is enough to leave anyone feeling like everything is crumbling around them. But finding out at the same time that you might also become infertile when you’ve always dreamed of becoming a mum is unimaginable pain.
This is the situation one mum found herself in after being diagnosed with breast cancer aged 33 and discovering that she would have to have chemotherapy to treat the disease. Doctors told Kreena Dhiman that it was likely she would lose her fertility as a result of the chemo and she soon found herself embarking on a journey to firstly survive, and then to become a parent in a way that she’d never expected.
Speaking on the latest episode of the podcast Open with Emma Campbell, Kreena, from West Sussex, candidly shared her story, which began with her diagnosis in 2013 and has amazingly resulted in her becoming a mother of four against all odds. She told how she had initially been dismissed by doctors after experiencing breast cancer symptoms, including inverted nipples. She was told she was too young to have the disease and her risk factors were low, but she pushed on and fought for a referral to an expert.
After attending numerous appointments and having ultrasounds, biopsies and blood tests, the doctors finally confirmed what she had known all along – that she had breast cancer. Initially, Kreena was told the cancer was contained to her breast and she would only need surgery and radiotherapy to treat it. However, after getting her pathology results back, she was devastated to discover that it had spread to her lymph nodes and she would have to have chemotherapy after all.