Grandmother thought she was just plump, but lost 140 pounds within 5 hours
Mary Clancey thought she was destined to be a plump lady, but she was surprised to find out that she had been growing a 140-pound tumor in her body.
Clancey, then 71 years old, had a 140-pound cancerous tumor removed during her five-hour operation on November 10, 2016.
The grandmother from St. Clair, Pennsylvania was encouraged by her son to seek medical help after doing daily tasks became harder for her to do.
“Things started getting harder to do -- harder to walk, harder to stand -- and then one day I couldn’t get out of bed. My son said, ‘Let’s call an ambulance and take you out of here,’” she said
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SHE THOUGHT SHE WAS JUST PLUMP
For 15 years, Clancey thought that she was “getting a little plump,” but little did she know that she was slowly growing a tumor in her abdomen.
Tests were conducted and the doctors at Lehigh Valley Health Network in Allentown, Pennsylvania, did a CAT scan and soon found out that she had an ovarian cyst, which had become a Stage 1 mass.
Back then, Clancey was weighing about 365 pounds.
Before the tumor was discovered, Clancey thought her weight gain was just caused by her unhealthy eating. Her doctors urged her to watch what she ate.
At the time, in Clancey’s mind, she just felt like she was made to become “a short round, fat little old lady.”
THE SURGERY AND AFTERMATH
The Morning Call revealed that during the operation, the doctors had to have a second operating table next to where Clancey was lying to make it easier for them to remove the tumor without the mass rupturing.
After the surgery, she had lost a total of 180 pounds of tumor and tissue, and she spent 26 days in the hospital for further observation.
After coming back home healthy and happy, Clancey joked, “I was going to be a short, fat, round little old lady before, so you never know, I might just turn into a voluptuous babe now.”
Following the successful operation, Clancey's doctor revealed that she did not need any further treatment like chemotherapy or radiation.
THE DOCTORS WERE HAPPY TO BE PART OF HER JOURNEY
The Lehigh Valley Health Network shared Clancey’s story on YouTube with the medical team expressing how happy they were to be part of the woman’s medical journey.
Dr. Richard Boulay, chief of gynecologic oncology at the hospital expressed, “When someone like Mary grabs your hand a couple of days later and says, ‘Thank you for giving me my life back,’ it doesn’t get any better than that.”
In another related news, a 130-pound tumor was also taken out of a man from Mississippi who had continuously been told it was just fat.