Ten years after going into remission, Samantha Harris revealed she has breast cancer again.
“Hey everybody. I have some shocking health news that I never thought in my lifetime again I would have to share, but I have a breast cancer recurrence,” the former Dancing With the Stars host, 50, shared in a Thursday, August 15, Instagram video. “[We] caught it early. It is very early. It is in the same exact location of my initial breast cancer [diagnosis] 10 years ago. It is tiny and I’m going to live and thrive and live my healthiest health life possible.”
Harris said that she continued to “monitor and look for any changes” over the years and will continue to share her breast cancer journey with fans to support people going through similar experiences.
“I am still and forever going to be your cheerleader with all of my research, all of my guidance and all of my support to live your healthiest healthy life possible,” she stated. “And all these things, all these changes, these lifestyle changes to get the toxins out of what is in, on and around our body to mitigate not just breast cancer and other cancers, but also heart disease, type 2 diabetes, neurodegenerative disorders.”
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She credits making healthy life choices with helping to prevent her second breast cancer diagnosis from being worse than it is. “These are the changes we make in our daily lives to combat disease, and I think the changes that I made truly made this grow incredibly slow and also to mitigate spread and I’m starting this next journey,” she said.
“Honestly, I just can’t believe it, but I will thrive and I wanted to share it with you all,” she stated before thanking her family and friends, her husband, Michael Hess, and her two daughters — Josselyn, 16, and Hillary, 13 — for their support.
“[My daughters were] just 3 and 6 at [the time of my] initial diagnosis 10 years ago,” Harris shared. “But now at 13 and 16, [I’m] having to share with them in a completely different way, and I couldn’t be more proud of how unbelievably strong and beautifully supportive they both have been.”
She concluded her update on an uplifting note, stating: “I am going to continue to support you all while I continue living my healthiest healthy life possible. And I will be seeing you soon and sharing more with you soon. I love you guys.”
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In a follow-up Thursday Instagram post, Harris noted that she got a biopsy on a lump she had been monitoring after a recent trip to Croatia. “Thank goodness I was vigilant. I got scans, and thank goodness all of the scans were clear of metastasis,” she said in the video, which featured clips and photos from her vacation and procedure. “That was my biggest worry.”
