When Karen Lurati looks in the mirror, she sees the body that betrayed her and is still coming to terms with the fact that she may never be able to “trust him again.”
The mother-of-two, from Melbourne, was diagnosed with liposarcoma at the age of 48, an extremely rare cancer that grows in fat cells.
Speaking to FEMAIL, the now 55-year-old woman explained that the cancer had been growing in her abdomen for 10 years, engulfing her vital organs and making her look as if she had gained weight.
And she had no idea.
At first, Karen thought her 7.5kg weight gain, which began after the birth of her second child, was because she was a busy, working mother.
When he started to get tired, he blamed it on the same thing.
Then, when doctors and naturopaths tried but failed to help her lose weight, Karen followed their advice that it was hormonal and part of the aging process.
Then the heavy sweats started and in his mind (and the doctors) this meant that hormones were definitely to blame.
Karen Lurati, pictured center with her daughters, had cancer for 10 years before she was diagnosed.
“I was told it was a sign of menopause, although at the time I looked pregnant, except it wasn’t completely smooth and hard, it was soft and lumpy,” she said.
But one day, the marketing professor began to feel a familiar “push” downward.
“It’s the same push you feel when your baby is descending and your body is preparing for birth,” Karen said.
But she was not pregnant. Her daughters were 11 and 14 years old and, according to her, at that time it would have been “impossible”.
“I thought it was a prolapse or something, because that was the only thing that made sense.”
Karen immediately went to the doctor who told her to have an internal ultrasound.
“The ultrasound technician couldn’t see anything, and so could an outsider,” he said.
Within minutes he realized something was wrong. The technician’s facial expressions had changed and other people had entered and left the room speaking in whispers.
“They told me they found something in a kidney, but they couldn’t be sure what it was,” Karen said.
They said they don’t normally go up that high, but there was obviously something.
The Melbourne mother-of-two was diagnosed with liposarcoma, a very rare cancer that grows in fat cells.
The mother’s stomach had been growing slowly for 10 years, she thought it was fat but in reality it was a huge 7.5kg tumor.
Karen went for more tests and received the devastating news that she had cancer.
“At the end of the conversation with the doctor I remember saying, ‘Wait, I have cancer?'” she said.
She was in such shock that she hadn’t processed the information.
Karen underwent a series of radiotherapy which worked to “create a pocket” around the fluid tumor.
She was then operated on for 11 hours to remove a kidney, part of her intestine and the huge growth.
“People keep asking me how I didn’t know: It was the size of two babies,” he said.
“But my doctors didn’t know either and I went to them to discuss it.”
Karen and her doctors assumed the change in her body shape was hormonal and a result of having two children.
Karen is telling her story to raise awareness about sarcoma and other rare cancers in the hopes that doctors will educate themselves about the signs and symptoms so they can help patients.
According to the Australian and New Zealand Sarcoma Association (ANZSA) Rare cancers account for 30 per cent of all cancers diagnosed in Australia.
Long-term survival rates are low, accounting for 42 per cent of all cancer deaths in Australia.
Karen was diagnosed with cancer in 2017; she still struggles with the idea that her body hid the disease for so long.
And every time she gets a scan to check for more growths, she fears it has happened again.
“It’s not until you get the results that you can really feel confident,” Karen said.
