April 01, 2023

Episode 24: Living well with cancer, reprioritizing what’s important to find balance, decision making in the face of uncertainty with Dr. Yi-wen Huang

50 minutes

A July 2021 diagnosis of metastatic breast cancer at the age of 43 completely changed Dr. Yi-wen Huang’s life. In this episode, Yi-wen talks about how she has reprioritized what is important in her life given her diagnosis. Telling her two children about her cancer was difficult, but the entire family has found silver linings in her diagnosis. Yi-wen has already had a number of treatment plans and talks about her decision making process and the positive experience she had as a participant in a clinical trial. She also sums up some of the learnings she’s gathered as she grapples with uncertainty.

Manta Maps are coming! Step-by-step subway maps that guide you through the entire cancer experience. Learn more here!

Key highlights:

Reprioritizing life after a metastatic breast cancer diagnosis

Navigating clinical trials and contributing to science

Communicating a cancer diagnosis to loved ones and finding silver linings

Life lessons learned in the face of uncertainty

About our guest:

Dr. Yi-wen Huang is a stage IV HER2+ metastatic breast cancer (MBC) patient. Her diagnosis in July 2021 at age 43 turned her life up-side-down. She has kept a positive outlook despite setbacks on the cancer journey. Yi-wen has a PhD in Physical Chemistry from Harvard University, worked in environmental and biotech instrumentation companies in the Bay Area before the diagnosis. She enjoys her current "retirement" filled with parenting duties, family time, pottery, running and self care (including continuous treatments).

Key Moments:

7 minutes 10 seconds: Staying at work after a metastatic breast cancer diagnosis - I think the fact that it metastasized made it easy to decide my priorities. I was in a lab and thought, “What am I doing here? Is this how I’m going to spend the rest of my life or time? Like any minute of it?” I don’t want to be away from my kids and family. So it made it easier to prioritize.

26 minutes 30 seconds: On how she got involved in a clinical trial - So when I found out it went to the brain, I immediately emailed both my UCSF and Stanford doctors to see if they had ideas or thoughts. The UCSF doctor actually had this clinical trial and encouraged me to come in, and then I qualified. There are different types of clinical trials, different phases, and I was on a Phase 2 trial that means there was no control group yet. So everybody gets the medication, and they want to see how well it works. I actually really enjoyed my experience on the clinical trial.

39 minutes 40 seconds: After telling her kids she had cancer - Pretty quickly life went back to normal. We live as normal a life as we can with the difference being that I’m a stay at home mom now, not a career woman. My kids will actually tell you that cancer is not all bad. They say we’re much closer now. We don’t talk about the future, we just enjoy all the moments we’re together.

45 minutes: Life lessons learned by living with uncertainty - My biggest lesson is to enjoy the moment. Enjoy your life all the time, every day. It’s a privilege and don’t think about how long, how much. Just take now. Take as much as you can, and live it day by day, moment by moment. Enjoy it to the fullest.

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