The 19-year-old college student admits that the procedure was 'not fun' at all, but it's necessary because chemotherapy and radiation can affect her fertility.
- Jan 12, 2024
AceShowbiz - An emergency surgery was not the only thing that Isabella Strahan had to go through following her brain cancer diagnosis. The daughter of Michael Strahan has revealed that she underwent a "rough" procedure to free her eggs before starting chemotherapy and radiation for a brain tumor.
"Since chemo and radiation can affect my fertility, my first step was egg freezing," she explained in the second installment of her YouTube series, where she's documenting her health journey. "That was not fun for me. At all."
Isabella was sitting on a couch with her twin sister Sophia and her father's girlfriend Kayla Quick by her side in the video. "You hated the shots," Kayla chimed in, referring to the hormone shots that are administered in the abdomen before the procedure, where eggs are retrieved from the ovaries.
"I am not a big needle person ... I've gotten used to my blood and IVs, but shots?" Isabella continued and winced as she added, "That was rough."
The teen went on detailing that she had to get three shots in her stomach every day for a week that "hurt so bad" right before undergoing the retrieval procedure, which took place on Thanksgiving Day. "It was like a CIA operation, getting there," Kayla quipped, adding that the family had a big Thanksgiving dinner together after Isabella's procedure.
"This was a good time. I still had hair. I loved that," Isabella shared. Two weeks later, she decided to shave her head because radiation made her hair so thin it was "worse than probably not having hair." She admitted, "It starts to thin and just kind of fall out. I couldn't even look at myself."
Isabella, who said she had never really cut her hair before, shaved it off herself in the middle of the night. "It was like 4 AM. This was like, midlife crisis," said the 19-year-old, who shaved it off while her sister Sophia joined her on FaceTime.
Isabella will start chemotherapy at Duke Children's Hospital & Health Center in Durham, North Carolina in February. She has announced that she's donating all financial proceeds from her vlog to The Preston Robert Tisch Brain Tumor Center at Duke University.
Isabella tearfully opened up about her cancer battle in the Thursday, January 11 episode of "Good Morning America". Joined by her father, she told Robin Roberts (II) that she found out she has medulloblastoma, a common malignant tumor that arises in the part of the brain located by the base of the skull, in October 2023 and underwent emergency surgery later that month, just a day before she turned 19.
Following the interview, Isabella's twin sister penned a heartwarming message on Instagram. Sophia shared several pictures of her lying on a hospital bed next to Isabella and wrote in the caption, "I'm so lucky to have the most amazing sister and best friend in the world."
"The last few months have been so much harder than we could have ever imagined, but it's made me realize just how strong you are," Sophia continued gushing over Isabella. "You inspire me and I'm so proud of you. Us forever."
