While the holidays can be a joyful time, for twins in Okotoks living with metastatic breast cancer, they can be a reminder of the challenges of maintaining a festive spirit.
For Conie Claeys and Cortney Drover, their breast cancer journeys started around similar times back in 2015.
“It’s kind of an elephant in the room — not only for us but for family members as well,” Claeys told CityNews from her home.
“In your mind, you’re kind of thinking … when could be the last one?”
After both of their breast cancer diagnosis, the pair started many treatments.
“Mine was a little bit lesser of a diagnosis than Cortney’s was, but I do believe we were the only set of twins in Alberta to be diagnosed within weeks of each other,” Claeys said.
However, years later they were both informed that their cancer had spread to different parts of their bodies, resulting in them both being diagnosed with metastatic breast cancer.
“I have four kids, I want to make the most of my time with them, but It can also be very sad because you never know when your last holiday can be,” Drover said.
“So it can be really happy just spending all that time with family and stuff but it also can be very sad because the reality is you never know.”
After both receiving similar diagnoses, the sisters decided to see if they carried the BRCA 2 gene, which is the gene that increases your chance of having breast or ovarian cancer.
“As unfortunate as it was that we did have that gene, it helped us make sense of the diagnosis and kind of put it into place,” Claeys said.
The sisters say they are happy they did this test adding that the holidays also serve as a call to action: a reminder for everyone to be proactive about their health.
“It’s still such a scary thing, but if you advocate for yourself, you know your body, and if you think that something is wrong even at a young age, even if you think it’s nothing, advocate for yourself and trust your gut,” Drover said.
As they decorate their tree and spend time with family, Courtney and Conie focus on the joy of the moment while advocating for awareness and early detection.