[00:00:00] Adam Walker: From Susan G Komen, this is Real Pink, a podcast exploring real stories, struggles, and triumphs related to breast cancer. We’re taking the conversation from the doctor’s office to your living room.
[00:00:17] Thank you for joining us again today on Real Pink. Today we’re joined by Olivia Munn for part two of our conversation about her journey navigating through breast cancer. We’re honored to partner with SKIMS and Olivia on this important campaign to inspire women to prioritize their health and do early screenings.
[00:00:35] This collaboration is deeply personal to Olivia and she’s absolutely inspiring us all by sharing her story in such an honest and thoughtful way. So let’s get back into it. Happy to hear that you were so proactive and your team was so engaged with you throughout the process. And I wonder, do you have a message for women about kind of breast self awareness?
[00:00:57] Olivia Munn: I think it’s important to know that there is no victory in proving your doctor wrong. You get to the other side and you’ve got a diagnosis and you say, Ah, I can’t wait to tell that doctor that they were wrong. Or you can tell all your friends they were wrong. I was right. I was right. There is no victory in that.
[00:01:19] So if you feel like something is not right, just keep drilling it. And think about every single side effect that you might be having, any kind of symptom you might be having, and bring that to the doctor and overload them with information. and refuse to leave until they get you the next test. You know, insurance is a crazy racket.
[00:01:49] I mean, insurance is like, you can have the best insurance and you’re like, what, why are you fighting me on this? Like this is, if I can get cured from this, it’s going to save you a lot more in the long run. Like, just help me now. Like you got it, you know, everything you can do to cash it early is going to be.
[00:02:06] the difference between life and death and also the quality of your life depending on the treatment you might have to do. So I just implore people to go to your doctor, overload them with information to the point where they’re like okay. You know, now it’s a part, it’s, you know, people can give you a lot of advice, like be your own advocate, tell your doctor, find the right doctor.
[00:02:32] But the truth is you’re dealing with personalities. These are just human beings too. And. Eventually, if you overload somebody and say like, I’m not leaving until you help me with this, you’re going to get a human being to crack and be like, okay. And I think that’s probably the best advice is that like, treat your doctor like any other human being that you might run into who you need help from.
[00:02:59] This is, you know if someone, if you were being mugged at gunpoint, you would scream out for help. And you would scream until you got the help. That’s how you have to think about cancer.
[00:03:14] Adam Walker: Yeah. Yeah. I love that you’re so powerful about advocating for yourself. That’s like, it’s so important. We talk about it on the show all the time.
[00:03:22] And I love that you’re, I love that’s your approach.
[00:03:24] Olivia Munn: But especially because I think that the word advocate and advocate for yourself. That phrase advocate for yourself. People say it so much that I
[00:03:34] think
[00:03:35] it’s be… and it’s so important to say it is so important to say, and I think it’s become a really great slogan,
[00:03:41] Adam Walker: right?
[00:03:41] Olivia Munn: But as somebody who went through it, I feel that when I hear things way too much one it does help because it puts it into your subconscious. But at the same time, I’m like, what does that mean after a while?
[00:03:53] Adam Walker: It loses its power. Yeah. Yeah.
[00:03:55] Olivia Munn: And also tell me how to advocate.
[00:03:57] What do I, what am I supposed to do?
[00:03:58] Adam Walker: Yeah, what does it mean? Yeah, it’s insane to have it here. What does that even mean? Yeah, that’s right.
[00:04:02] Olivia Munn: Walk me through the steps of advocating for myself.
[00:04:04] Adam Walker: Yeah, that’s right. So yeah, so you mentioned earlier about, you know, there was a point at which you weren’t sure if you were going to go public with your journey or not.
[00:04:12] And I know that, I think I read that initially you decided to document your journey kind of on video for your son in case you didn’t make it, which as I think every parent would hear that and just Be heartbroken… that’s so tough to hear that.
[00:04:28] Can you talk about why you ultimately decided to share your story publicly and what was why that was so important to you?
[00:04:35] Olivia Munn: John and I were talking one night as we were going through photos and he said you were walking around with cancer and you had no idea. Man, we had no idea in this photo you had cancer, in this photo you had cancer, in this photo you had cancer.
[00:04:54] And then it hit me. It’s like, wow, how many other women, how many mothers, sisters, aunts, grandmothers, daughters walking around with breast cancer and no idea. And they won’t know until, till it’s too late. And at that point I thought, yeah I need to tell people. And especially since what I could offer was something that wasn’t going to cost any money and it was free online, I thought, well, if every woman just knew her risk percentage, that would be huge.
[00:05:41] I mean, there’s a lot of things that you need to know in your life. And Dr. Alibadi says, you need to know your social security number. and your percentage of getting breast cancer in your life.
[00:05:52] Adam Walker: I love that. And the fact that you’ve gone public, I would imagine has made a tremendous impact in people’s lives that you’ll never even know about because people found it that otherwise wouldn’t have.
[00:06:02] And, you know, on, on their behalf, I would just say thank you for, from, for their family, because there are people that I think you’ve saved lives and not, you won’t even know it. So.
[00:06:14] Olivia Munn: That means a lot. Thank you so much. I actually got a text from one of my friends Yesterday that, that made me, you know, start bawling was she’s gone through breast cancer and she kind of, she’s one of the people that really helped me through it and and she texted me this beautiful text that she’d gone through, she’d gone to see her doctor and my friend had gone in and, you know, and said, Oh, you know, I’m friends with Olivia.
[00:06:45] And she said that just the week before last week. A woman came in and because of me talking about the breast cancer risk assessment test she took it, did an MRI, and found out that she has breast cancer. stage two breast cancer. And it was her two positive, which now her two can double in size every day.
[00:07:08] So so it was like so like that took me back. Like, it was just like, Stories like that. Like I said it earlier, but it is incredibly healing because you know, like I feel that like maybe I went through all of this for a reason. Maybe I was supposed to have cancer for this reason.
[00:07:31] Adam Walker: Yeah. Well, I mean you’re making a huge impact.
[00:07:34] And that’s, you know, one of the reasons we’re so happy to have you on the show. So I wanted to ask you, so you recently had a daughter, we got to see her earlier when we were sort of chit chatting. Super cute. You know for young women that are navigating breast cancer, fertility’s, you know, obviously a major concern.
[00:07:50] I know you kind of talked a little bit about that in your story, but I wonder like if you just kind of give us a quick overview of like how that factored in to your decision making, how that factored into your treatment.
[00:08:02] Olivia Munn: You know, like I said I froze my eggs because I wanted to have an insurance plan in case.
[00:08:13] I ever wanted kids down the road. I also didn’t want to be pressured by my career. I didn’t want to be pressured into finding somebody, you know, to to have a baby with. If I just wanted to have this extra insurance. And I think I do feel that every woman should be given the opportunity. I think that it should be like covered by health insurance.
[00:08:39] I think that you should do it as young as you can look at, you know, because the younger your eggs are the healthier they’re going to be. And then maybe you have to have your babies later on if that’s what you wanted. And you know, we really knew that we weren’t done growing our family and saving eggs and harvesting eggs and turning them into embryos was was a non negotiable.
[00:09:08] Right. I knew I couldn’t carry and that was incredibly difficult and a lot of sleepless nights from that. And, you know, to find a surrogate. For me, it felt really difficult because I thought, I mean, I have to find myself out in the world again. Somebody who I know will, you know, yeah, love my baby the way that I love and every stage of it and try to minimize anxiety and all of those, you know, you know, external things that can affect you that then affects the baby.
[00:09:48] And I was so lucky I found the most amazing, kind, generous, loving surrogate. Man, oh man, I just and I’ve heard some nightmares surrogacy stories from friends and man, we just What a blessing. I just I’m just so grateful.
[00:10:11] Adam Walker: Oh, that’s great. I love that. So so I’d like to shift gears for a minute and talk about body image.
[00:10:17] I know that, you know, a lot of women struggle with that and accepting their bodies after surgery. You certainly mentioned that earlier as you were sort of talking through things, you know, you’re a public figure, your photos taken quite a bit more than mine for certain. And so I wonder if you can just kind of walk through like how you’ve navigated that part of your journey.
[00:10:37] Olivia Munn: I never connected my femininity to my breasts, and I had heard that a lot from people, and I was warned that by my doctors, they were saying, look a lot of women can feel like they’re no longer women when they don’t have breasts. And I want you to be prepared for that psychologically. They, I talked with my therapist about it.
[00:11:05] They were all preparing me, but I would say to them no, that’s not I don’t connect to that at all. So don’t worry. But after the double mastectomy, it I don’t know if it’s because someone put that into my head and it was or if it was already dormant and just came out because of the surgery.
[00:11:31] But I felt really disconnected to my body.
[00:11:39] Adam Walker: Okay.
[00:11:40] Olivia Munn: I felt like I woke up on another planet and people had just like rearranged my body and like I felt like an experiment. Felt really strange. And, you know, the scars are pretty intense for me now. Like I’m doing laser treatments a lot and creams and things like that.
[00:12:03] And I think the coloring could go away over time. But the texture of the scar, I don’t think really will go away and I’ll kind of be noticed. And, you know, my scars are visible in places on my body that other people don’t have visible scars for some reason. And I, like I grew my hair out because I wanted to be able to cover my scars if I wanted to.
[00:12:34] And I did want to. And and then I just had this realization when I looked in the mirror once and I started to love my body more and embrace my scars and my new breasts more because they are just proof of how hard I fought.
[00:13:02] Adam Walker: That’s right. Yeah, that’s right.
[00:13:04] Olivia Munn: Yeah.
[00:13:04] Adam Walker: I love that. That’s a great perspective.
[00:13:08] Olivia Munn: Thank you.
[00:13:08] Adam Walker: And this is the, I mean, this is the new healthier you, right?
[00:13:12] Olivia Munn: Yes. And when you speak about the new healthier me, I mean I I no longer have cancer in my breasts, but also are, I’m also so much kinder to myself, you know, I’m mentally healthier as well. And I didn’t realize how unkind my internal thoughts were until I was given this diagnosis.
[00:13:42] It was like almost immediately I had to drop everything that wasn’t serving me. I knew that I could not climb this mountain carrying all this extra emotional baggage and would range from regrets of, Oh, I should have taken this project or I shouldn’t have taken this project, or why did I stay in that relationship so long?
[00:14:03] Or why was I? inconsiderate in this moment, or why was I so jealous or why? Why am I not progressing enough in life? I mean, just so many regrets. And then also frustration from other things, frustration from feeling that life was unfair in moments or feeling like that I was judged for things that I never did.
[00:14:26] And I didn’t ever get to clear my name. And I, there was every kind of negative thing that I was holding on to and the anxiety of the future. Yeah. All of those things. just fell to the wayside because I could not fight cancer with anything else on my brain besides positivity and focus. And when I got to the other side of all of my surgeries, I realized that I didn’t want to pick it back up again.
[00:15:01] Adam Walker: Wow. That’s beautiful. I love that.
[00:15:03] Olivia Munn: Yeah. Well, thank God I went through that. I mean, if anything, the cancer gave me that.
[00:15:13] Adam Walker: Wow, that’s fantastic. So I wonder if we could shift gears just a little bit. I want to talk about your support network. So you mentioned you mentioned your husband a few times.
[00:15:23] I saw another interview you gave where you talked about him, you know, taking care of your son and taking him places and then running to take, sit with you at the hospital during nap time and all that sort of stuff. And then I know that, I think you mentioned earlier in this interview that your mom is there helping you with stuff.
[00:15:35] So tell us a little bit about, you know, your support network and what, like, what that’s been like, you know, throughout your experience.
[00:15:41] Olivia Munn: For the first, you know, couple years it was tough. It was, you know, getting to, to know someone as I’m starting a family with them. And and then this cancer diagnosis comes in and you really can’t attest for your bravery and courage and how well someone will support you until you’ve been challenged.
[00:16:07] And this was I think at the top of challenges and he just was so calm and patient and man, the guy has energy to take care of me and our baby and his work all at the same time. I mean, I am truly amazed at his ability to just multitask for really big things, not just like running, but he could really do it all.
[00:16:38] And and that all comes from the pride he feels and taking care of the People who need him and I’m really grateful for him for that. My mom came and she is John’s best friend.
[00:16:56] She
[00:16:57] Adam Walker: Ha! I love it. I love it.
[00:16:59] Olivia Munn: They sit around and watch Korean movies. John has a notepad, like a yellow legal notepad, that’s like two pages long of different movies he wants to watch with my mom.
[00:17:09] And they sit around and watch. So she was really there to keep him company when I was in the hospital.
[00:17:14] Adam Walker: Yeah.
[00:17:15] Olivia Munn: And she is an amazing cook. Like anything that you can think of, she’ll make and she makes it so quickly. Like John will say like, can I have Kung Pao chicken and lemon chicken and some bun bowels and within like 45 minutes, they are all there.
[00:17:32] I’m not exaggerating. I don’t know.
[00:17:34] Adam Walker: Those are complex. That’s hard to make.
[00:17:36] Olivia Munn: Yeah. And she’s been doing it forever. It’s been And sometimes he’ll say like, do you want your mom to come? I mean, before my surgery, he’s like, do you want your mom to come? And I said no, she doesn’t need to come. I think we just want it like calm in the house and.
[00:17:51] I just think that I want to just like sleep and rest and then I looked at him and I was like, wait, but do you want my mom to come? Because the look on his face was just sheer disappointment. And he goes, well, for me, I would like it. And I was like, okay.
[00:18:10] Adam Walker: That’s like the greatest in law relationship ever. That’s amazing. You can’t ask for more than that.
[00:18:16] Olivia Munn: Yeah. And then I would say the different women that I would reach out to who. Had breast cancer or who connected with me connected me with friends who had breast cancer. One of my good friends, Stephanie Levinson, she connected me with this woman, Jessica St.
[00:18:32] Clair, and Jessica had gone through breast cancer and she was my friend. guiding star. She was very honest with me about it. I’m somebody who I want to hear the honest, brutal truth, no matter how scary it might be. I like to know it. I need to know it. And she was very clear with me, but also she was very positive.
[00:18:54] She was like, she’s like, Any symptom that you can think of, she’s like, there is a a medicine that can help you through it. And she said, I promise you, you may not feel it right now, but you will be so happy one day that you had gone through this. She’s right. You know I feel really grateful that.
[00:19:20] Adam Walker: I got through this journey. You sort of alluded to this, I think several times in this conversation, but like, what, like what perspectives have changed for you for having had breast cancer? Like what, like, how has your life changed? How has your perspective changed? How’s your approach to the things changed?
[00:19:38] Olivia Munn: I don’t like wasting time anymore. I wasted my time in relationships that were really toxic and emotionally abusive and sometimes not the right person for me. Nice person, not for me. And I stayed in them for whatever reasons, you know a lot of it probably goes back to your childhood as we all are aware of.
[00:20:14] But I know that I didn’t work through childhood issues or emotional issues enough in my life. And that’s why I wasted time in relationships. And with people in my life or friendships and I, you know, like I would ruminate on things a lot and like I said earlier, like some regrets and, you know, no matter how hard anyone else can be on me.
[00:20:50] I was definitely the hardest on myself and. I had a really hard time forgiving myself and and, you know, I made a lot of mistakes in my life small and big and and I don’t think I ever looked at it as I was just growing and changing and, you know, it’s youth and you can be in your twenties and still be naive and.
[00:21:26] Adam Walker: Yeah.
[00:21:26] Olivia Munn: And make bad decisions. And I think I say you can still be in your, you know, twins, but the, you know, for me, when I look back on my twenties, I’ll be like, you knew better, but I, sometimes you don’t know better. And and I don’t waste time anymore. Now that doesn’t mean that I’m going, it’s actually the opposite.
[00:21:48] I sit with my family, I sit with myself I meditate a lot more. I. I take the extra time to take care of myself. I don’t regret the things I said no to. I usually regret the things that I said yes to.
[00:22:07] Adam Walker: Yeah, that’s not if that’s not the best advice right there. I don’t know what it is. That’s amazing.
[00:22:13] Yeah, that’s spot on. So which actually leads me to my last question for you, which is, you know, there’s a lot of listeners, that are facing breast cancer right now. What would your message to them be? Maybe something that you wish you’d known going into it.
[00:22:33] Olivia Munn: I wish I knew how beautiful and supportive the breast cancer community is. It’s not that I didn’t think they were. I just never thought about it. And man, someone wrote on my Instagram comments and then someone said it to me Also, when I met them and they, I was walking out of the store and someone stopped me and they’d gone through breast cancer and I said this phrase to me, they said welcome to the worst club with the best members.
[00:23:10] And I was like, Oh, and that really meant a lot to me and really touched me. Every breast cancer is different. We all have different diagnoses. But we’re all walking the same path. We were all told you have breast cancer. Every one of us knows what that’s like in that moment. And all of us know what it’s like to get a list of doctors and go find these doctors and put your team together.
[00:23:46] And we all know the fear, and we all know the We all know the moment that we have to surrender and just not surrender to the cancer, but surrender to the idea and the fact that we have to fight. We are all fighters and we all battle. And I just, I want everyone who’s going through this to know that I see you and I feel you and you are like family to me.
[00:24:22] So if you ever see me out in the street or anywhere, stop me, talk to me for an hour if you want. Because so many people have done the same for me.
[00:24:34] Adam Walker: Man that is An amazing final thought and I really appreciate you sharing that with us. Olivia, you, your story is amazing. I really appreciate all the thoughts you’ve shared with us today.
[00:24:47] Thank you so much for joining us on Real Pink.
[00:24:50] Olivia Munn: Thank you for having me. Thank you for everything you guys do for women facing this around the world. It’s a really comforting thing to, to be able to have this podcast.
[00:25:00] Adam Walker: It’s It’s been a blessing. It’s a blessing.
[00:25:08] Thanks for listening to Real Pink, A weekly podcast by Susan G Komen. For more episodes, visit real pink.Komen.org. And for more on breast cancer, visit Komen.org. Make sure to check out at Susan G Komen on social media. I’m your host, Adam. You can find me on Twitter at AJ Walker or on my blog adam j walker.com.