Wimbledon champion Martina Navratilova has disclosed her cancer diagnosis, promising to ‘fight’ with everything she has.
The 66-year-old American tennis player of Czech origin has throat and breast cancer, and treatment will begin later this month.
In November of last year, she detected an enlarged lymph node in her neck, and a biopsy revealed stage one throat cancer.
Additional examinations revealed a tumor in her breast, which was later confirmed as an unrelated malignancy.
“This double whammy is dangerous but still fixable,” said Navratilova, who has won Wimbledon a record nine times.
“I’m praying for a good conclusion. It’ll stink for a while, but I’ll fight with everything I’ve got.”
Her prognosis was also hailed as ‘excellent’ in a statement from her representative, who also stated that she would no longer be traveling to the Australian Open later this month, where she was scheduled to work as a pundit.
Martina Navratilova has been diagnosed with stage one throat cancer, according to a statement.
“The outlook is good and Martina will start her treatment this month.
“The cancer kind is HPV, and this specific type responds extremely wel
“Growing up in a totalitarian country, you have to keep everything buttoned up,” Navratilova continued. Then I abandoned my family, and I hadn’t seen my parents in four years. And it’s about this that I’ll start crying, because I can’t get that time back.
“You simply think, let’s get this over with. Because the worst of my life had already passed.
“This is only about me; I can live with it, but what upset me was hurting my mother. Because cancer seemed so simple.”
to treatment. During the WTA finals in Fort Worth, Martina detected an enlarged lymph node in her neck. When it didn’t go down, a biopsy was performed, and the results revealed that the patient had stage one throat cancer.
“At the same time as Martina was undergoing the testing for the throat, a suspicious form was located in her breast, which was eventually identified as cancer, absolutely unconnected to the throat malignancy.
“Both of these malignancies are in their early stages and have promising prognosis. Martina will not be covering the Australian Open for Tennis Channel from their studio, although she hopes to join in on occasion through Zoom.”
Navratilova, who is married to Julia Lemigova, a former Russian beauty queen, was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2010.
“I found out it was DCIS, which is not the worst sort,” she stated on The All New Monty: Ladies Night in 2019. I sometimes feel like I got lucky and got the nice cancer – if there ever was an oxymoron.
“The worst things for me were going back to the doctor and getting a mammogram to see if there was anything else.”
