3 days ago
Influencer Bridget Bahl shares update on breast cancer battle following lumpectomy procedure
Fashion influencer Bridget Bahl has shared a new update on her ongoing battle with breast cancer.
The social media star, 41, was diagnosed with the disease not long after marrying Texas-based plastic surgeon Dr. Michael Chiodo in a lavish New York City wedding.
This week, she went into hospital for a lumpectomy, which she plans to follow up with radiation, immunotherapy and 'potentially more chemo'.
Her husband Michael shared an update on Bridget's health shortly after the surgery.
'Surgery went well, it was smooth and routine,' he wrote on her Instagram page.
'Bridget has no pain in her breast whatsoever. They did remove 4 lymph nodes and that is a sensitive area so it's perfectly normal to feel pain in that area. It's exactly what our surgeon told us to anticipate,' he continued.
Bridget then followed up with a post of her own where she thanked both Michael and God for helping her on her cancer journey.
'I love you so much. And you're getting pretty good at doing my makeup. I am so beyond blessed to have our wonderful husband and a wonderful community,' she wrote.
'I feel so overwhelmed thinking about how hard this would all be without him and without you. Prayers up for clean margins! I do need to declare that I believe I am healed in Jesus' name!!! God is here with me. He will make beauty from ashes.'
She also urged her million followers to do their breast exams so that they wouldn't end up in hospital like her.
Bridget was in the midst of fertility treatment last year when she received the devastating news about her breast cancer.
She said she was 'maybe one or two days' into fertility treatment, and had a routine sonogram and blood work with her doctor, when she told him she felt something in her breast.
'And he said, "We're stopping right now, you have to... go in for imaging,' she recounted through tears in a video shared last year.
The doctor called back just one day later 'and unfortunately confirmed that I do have breast cancer and that it has spread to a lymph node.'
Bridget went on to have chemotherapy, surgery and radiation to treat the cancer.
She explained that she decided to share the news of her diagnosis with her followers because it 'feels like way too huge of an opportunity to not share,' noting that Instagram comprises 90 percent women.
'I know that by sharing this I will help someone else catch it sooner, and that is reason enough for me,' Bahl added in the caption to her video.
The average risk of a woman in the US developing breast cancer is about 13 percent, meaning that one in every eight women will develop breast cancer, according to the American Cancer Society.
But in recent years, incidence rates have increased by 0.6 percent - though the rise in incidence rates in women under the age of 50 is steeper at 1 percent.
Breast cancer is now the second leading cause of cancer death in women, only surpassed by lung cancer.
The chances that any woman will die from breast cancer is currently about 1 in 40.
Fashion influencer Bridget boasts over a million followers on social media.
She is known for her popular clothing brand The Bar and is also big on affiliate shopping sites like LTK.
