Staying on top of your health screenings is important. In recent years, many people have let their regular medical appointments fall to the wayside and even avoided going to the doctor for new issues that have arisen.
Kari's story will remind you why it's so important not to ignore your body. Like many women in their 40s, Kari regularly got pap smears and mammograms. She felt in control of her health and had few concerns.
Then Kari began noticing some changes in her belly button. When one day the change in appearance, which made the area around her belly button look the same color as a pencil eraser, was coupled with pain, she reached out to her doctor.
At first, Kari's doctors thought it was a skin issue. A biopsy revealed that the physical change was indicative of something bigger.
"I called the dermatologist. He thought it was a neuroma which isn't a big deal. He removed it and told me he was going to send it to the lab to be tested," Kari told The Doctors.
A few days later, Kari's dermatologist called her to say it was more serious than he'd initially thought and that ovarian cancer cells were detected.
"My world just froze for a minute. I didn't even know what to do next. It was the furthest thing from my mind," Kari shared.
Kari went through three rounds of chemotherapy before surgery to remove all the cancer from her body.
Kari urges women to contact their doctors when they're experiencing abnormalities in their bodies, even when they think it's insignificant. She found out after diagnosis that a number of other symptoms, such as back pain and heartburn, were related to the cancer.
"None of them were things I would have gone to the doctor to ask about," she noted.
