Certificates. Cancer: Like Kate Middleton, they battled the disease before age 50… “We all have the resources to get there”

She remembers it like it was yesterday. On June 19, 2021, Ludivine Edouard*, 34, was lying in bed when she noticed a “distortion” through her T-shirt and a “mass” in her breast. “I immediately went to the gynecologist. I was so scared that I brought it up an hour. As if that would change anything,” she says. Less than a month later, the diagnosis came: triple negative breast cancer, an aggressive type of cancer that particularly affects young women.

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After six months of chemotherapy, a double mastectomy, an axillary dissection, then radiotherapy, she thinks she is free of her cancer. Until the iteration in March 2023. “It was very difficult. Even more than the first time,” she recalls. The girl has to once again make this announcement to her 2-and-a-half-year-old and 4-year-old children. “I had to explain to them that it’s not their fault, it’s not because they didn’t clean their room one day that Mom still has a boo-boo.”

“From the beginning, I saw myself as a winner”

For Clelia Zak, 36, it’s another metaphor that allows her to explain her cancer to her children: her tumor is a crab and she’s a pirate, a way to justify the turban she wears after losing her hair. The 30-year-old gave birth to her little girl in August 2023 when she noticed something went wrong while breastfeeding. She was also diagnosed with triple negative breast cancer. “My first thought? I told myself it was a hidden camera,” recalls the young mother. “Then I said to myself, I can’t die, leave my family, my three-month-old baby.”

After the initial shock, he goes into “warrior mode”. “I immediately saw myself as Wonder Woman fighting this tumor. It allowed me to hold on. From the beginning, I saw myself as a winner. It was like a marathon and I saw myself crossing the line. “Arrival, with my husband. and the children in the foreground.”

“At 37, when you hear the word cancer you find it very difficult,” explains Mathieu Le Guen. The Brestois was diagnosed with testicular cancer in 2021. After an orchiectomy (ablation), the young father of two also thinks he is cured, but barely six months later, the cancer returns. Wanting to “put all chances aside”, he opted for intensive treatment at the Gustave Roussy Institute in Paris. “I had to spend 17 to 18 days in a sterile room with a week to 10 days of rest between each treatment.” Despite the harshness of the treatment and the isolation away from his loved ones, Mathieu Le Guen refuses to “give up”: “Once you’re committed, you can’t go back. You want to get out of it.”

Deny “reduction” of symptoms

At a pivotal moment between middle school and high school, Ophelie Laplace experiences strange knee pain that no doctor can explain. After a biopsy, she was diagnosed with chondrosarcoma of the femur. A 13cm bone has been removed from a Pelois woman’s thigh. “At 15, we’re in denial. We don’t realize it,” she recalls. In total, she has to undergo 9 reconstructive operations. “With every operation, we have to relearn everything: how to stand, how to walk. The first time, it took six months,” he says. She was in a wheelchair when she entered second grade. A victim of harassment, she must give up face-to-face teaching. Despite her daily pain, which continues nearly 13 years later, Ophelie Laplace persevered to pursue higher studies and complete landscape engineering school.

At 27, she sees her journey as a “life lesson”: “No matter the challenges, always have a positive goal to aim for. This state of mind saves me every day.” For Clelia Zack, her journey has been like a roller coaster: “When you’re at your lowest, it’s very hard to come back. But what I always tell people close to me is that it’s going to take as long as possible. I have to. , but I know I’ll be back.” She continues: “Even in our moments of greatest weakness, we have the resources within us to push through and get there. My chemo seemed insurmountable. I only have 2 sessions left.”

Many of them report “reduction” after consulting doctors, who ruled out the possibility of cancer due to their young age. Ludivine Edouard underlines, “The chance of survival goes from perfect to very low within a few weeks. A supporter of the Rose Up Association that informs, supports and defends the rights of women affected by cancer, she advocates screening before the age of 50. “You have to listen to your body, at the slightest unusual pain, you should not hesitate to consult. You are safe from anything, even in your thirties,” adds Mathieu Le Guen. Despite the fear of another recurrence, Ludivine Edouard is doing everything “to succeed in the plan”: “I’m getting married in June,” she announces. “The potential is there, the research is making great progress, we have to trust it.”

*Last name has been changed