Daria overcame cervical cancer

A few weeks ago, FCF was contacted by Daria: a 30-year-old Czech woman who was diagnosed with cervical cancer 2 years ago. In her personal story, you can read about what the diagnosis did to her and why she set up a donation for FCF. We are inspired by this powerful woman and grateful for the beautiful donation!

"I am Daria and I live in Prague, Czech Republic. I am currently 30 and I got diagnosed with cervical cancer at the age of 28. I am living a healthy life: I do sports, I don't drink or smoke. During the regular checkup with a PAP smear (every half year) starting from 24th of age everything was good. Until the check up in august '20, where cytology wasn't good. It took the doctors 3 months to get the right diagnosis of cervical cancer. All that time I didn't have any symptoms.

I got operated in Dec '20 followed by 3 months of treatment. During that phase I was in a survival mode. I got a severe bleeding 1 month after OK with anemia.

The real shock came after 6 months. It hit me psychologically, because I was living a healthy life and realized this disease is not choosing. It transformed everything in my mind. Like my attitude towards maternity. I was focusing on my personal life and my career but now I got to wonder: For what role am I here? Will I be happy if I can't fulfill maternity? What are my values in life?

The idea to donate came when my birthday was approaching and I was celebrating my first year post OK. I looked on Facebook for 'Facebook donations and cervical cancer' and your organization came up. I did research about your organization and your projects and had a good feeling. So I started the event and in 2 days 400 euro was donated.

I was really surprised by this big amount in this short time and how many people related to my personal story. Not only I was surprised by the donations (interesting was that a lot of men donated), but my Messenger inbox was exploding with supportive messages and love. Also other women shared their personal story and said to me that I was so brave sharing this story. I don't understand why, I think it is nothing to be ashamed of and it is important to create awareness. Even in Czech Republic, where healthcare overall is good, people are still not fully aware about the disease and are afraid of doing screening (PAP smear). It made me realize that in underdeveloped countries this is an even bigger problem and that's why I am very happy that I (and the people who donated) could support the work of Female Cancer Foundation. "