2022 Survivor Profile - Janet Spool

Janet Spool remembers the moment she learned she had breast cancer. The school secretary, then 67, was about to leave for work on August 8, 2016 when her radiologist called to deliver the news: a biopsy of her left breast revealed Stage I invasive ductal carcinoma, an early-stage cancer of the milk duct that invades the surrounding breast tissue.

The New Hyde Park mother of two and grandmother of four never saw it coming. “My mother died of ovarian cancer at 80,” Janet recalled, “and her siblings had throat, renal and colon cancer, but they were all smokers. So, I thought it won’t happen to me.”

Doctors gave Janet a choice: undergo a lumpectomy, a surgery to remove the tumor from her breast, or a mastectomy, removal of the entire breast. She opted for a double mastectomy and had her unaffected breast removed as well. “I felt I didn’t want to think about this [cancer] again and have to go through this,” she said.

After the surgery, an oncotype test that predicts risk for cancer recurrence yielded an abnormally high score, so doctors prescribed four rounds of chemotherapy.

But before she was scheduled to begin treatment, she developed shingles, a painful viral infection characterized by a blistering skin rash on the body. Once the infection cleared, the adverse effects of chemotherapy — fatigue, loss of appetite, weight changes and hair loss — kicked in.

Despite her physical challenges and emotional distress, she “focused on staying positive and on being recovered and feeling well,” Janet said.

Support from her family, friends and colleagues, who showered her with uplifting notes, cards, gifts and home-cooked meals, buoyed her spirits.

Now 73 and cancer-free for six years, Janet encourages women to undergo annual mammograms and checkups. “One in eight people get breast cancer; the odds are very high,” said Janet, now a volunteer for the Adelphi NY Statewide Breast Cancer Hotline & Support Program. She’s paying it forward and bringing emotional healing and hope to those newly diagnosed with the disease. “If I didn’t have a mammogram, what was very small [tumor] would have grown.”