Olivia Munn Paused Breast Cancer Treatment To Freeze Embryos With John Mulaney
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Olivia Munn was diagnosed with luminal B breast cancer last year.
During breast cancer treatment, she had a double mastectomy and breast reconstruction surgery, and went into medically-induced menopause.
She also had a hysterectomy.
Olivia Munn has been through a lot in the past year. She was diagnosed with luminal B breast cancer, had a double mastectomy and breast reconstruction surgery, and went into medically-induced menopause. Now, she’s sharing that she also had a hysterectomy.
The 43-year-old revealed the news in a new interview with Vogue. “I have now had an oophorectomy and hysterectomy. I took out my uterus, fallopian tubes, and ovaries,” she said.
Olivia said this was a hard choice for her to make, given that she wants to have more children. However, her type of cancer is a hormone receptor-positive type that feeds and grows in the presence of estrogen. She was taking a medication called Lupron to suppress the estrogen in her body, and that made her feel wiped out.
“The side effects of the medication hit me almost immediately,” Olivia said. “It was next-level, debilitating exhaustion. I would wake up in the morning and almost immediately need to get back into bed. If you asked Malcolm, ‘Where does daddy work?’ He'd run to his [partner John Mulaney’s] desk, and if you asked him, ‘Where does mommy work?’ He'd point to my bed. It was so sweet. But at the same time, it was breaking my heart because this is his image of me.”
Before her surgery, Olivia decided to do an egg retrieval to try to make embryos with John. Olivia shared that she had retrieved eggs before—when she was 33, 39, and then 42.
“It's interesting because my 33-year-old eggs were great. My 39-year-old eggs? None of them worked," she said. "As you get older, one month can have great eggs, the other not so much."
After her diagnosis, Olivia said she and John decided to do one more round of egg retrievals.
“John and I talked about it a lot and we don't feel like we're done growing our family, but didn't know if I would have to do chemotherapy or radiation," she said. “We just wanted a few more eggs. At my age, one in every 10 eggs are healthy, and we were hoping to make one embryo from this retrieval.”
Doctors ended up retrieving seven eggs. And of those, two healthy embryos were created. “John and I just started crying. It was just so exciting because not only did we get it in one retrieval, but it also meant that I didn't have to keep putting myself at risk. It was just amazing,” Olivia said.
Olivia previously shared in April that she was diagnosed with breast cancer after her doctor did a breast cancer risk assessment for her. Since speaking out about her diagnosis, she’s encouraged other women to do the same thing.
Olivia just posted on Instagram about her latest surgery, noting that it was her “fifth, and hopefully final, surgery in my battle against breast cancer.”
She added, “I hope by sharing this it helps other women who are fighting this terrible disease feel less alone.”
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