Days of Our Lives star Suzanne Rogers is opening up about being diagnosed with stage II colon cancer.
The veteran actress — who has played soap favorite Maggie Horton for more than five decades — told TV Insider in an interview published on Thursday, October 30, that she made a doctor’s appointment after feeling that something “wasn’t quite right” over the summer.
Rogers’ doctor sent her for a colonoscopy, after which she spoke to a surgeon. “He said, ‘I want you to have an MRI and I want you to have a PET scan, and I’m going to do a biopsy.’ And the minute he said that, I knew that it was something more,” the actress said.
Rogers, 82, told the outlet that she went into the hospital for another procedure, after which she was diagnosed with stage II colorectal cancer.
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“He said, ‘You have cancer, and you have to start treatment.’ It was all a shock. I mean, I think I was in a shock for several days because I take pretty good care of myself. But he said, ‘It’s a good thing you caught it in time,’” Rogers said.
The actress finished shooting on Days of Our Lives in June and began treatment almost immediately after. Much of Rogers’ treatment occurred while the soap was on a six-week hiatus.
“It was radiation every day and chemo every day for six weeks and it was tough,” she said. “It was tough knowing you had to do it five days a week, and then you had off Saturday and Sunday. I thoroughly enjoyed my weekends because I didn’t have to go to and see a doctor. I was so tired of seeing doctors.”
“I was able to keep it under wraps and then the show took that break, so it wasn’t necessary to get into it all then. It helped me because it gave me even more time to chill and to get myself healthy,” she added.
Rogers opened up about the toll her treatment took on her, revealing that she struggled with lethargy.
“The biggest thing is that I was tired because that’s not like me. I have a lot of energy all the time, so it really kind of shook me thinking, ‘Am I going to get my energy back?’” she shared. “And it seems like it’s coming back. It’s not 100% yet, but I feel better. Today, I feel really good, and that’s happening more and more than the other way around, so I’m really happy about that.”
Rogers completed her cancer treatment at the end of July and is expected back on the Days of Our Lives set next week.
“I’m feeling really good. I start back to work next week, so we’ll see how that goes,” she said. “Now, I’m feeling anxious like I do any time I get scripts because I want to do my very best and you don’t want to hold up anybody. So that’s the only anxiousness I feel. It’s not because of my illness, let’s put it that way.”
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Thankfully, Days of Our Lives viewers won’t notice much of a difference in Maggie’s appearance when Rogers returns to Salem.
“I didn’t lose my hair,” she said. “I guess because I was taking the chemo pills. I’m sure there’ll be people that are saying, ‘Well, she didn’t really have cancer,’ but you know what? I really don’t care what people say. I know what I’ve gone through, and I’ve come out on the other side, so that’s all I care about.”
