Woman Fights Breast Cancer, Learns To Live In Moment

COLUMBUS, Ohio -- At 32 years old, you're supposed to have the world on a string.

Many women are thinking about careers, family, babies. Not breast cancer.

Zoe Buyalos put the kettle on for tea and settled in for a talk with NBC 4’s Mikaela Hunt.

Buyalos was at a chemo treatment 48 hours before she met with Hunt.

“That's the craziest part. This shouldn't be happening, you know ... because I am so young. And you think 60 is when you start focusing on that kind of thing.”

She talked about a doctor at a clinic who originally told her the lump in her breast was nothing.

She couldn't afford a second opinion.

“I don't have insurance. I work for myself. I don't have enough money. I don't have insurance,” she said through tears.

Her apartment is filled with signs of life – thriving houseplants.

It's nice to see things grow, she said.

It was the mass growing inside her body that was concerning her to the core, though.

She felt as though the NBC 4 Health and Fitness Expo was a way to confirm her suspicions.

“I explained that I'd been to a doctor and really felt something was wrong. I was embarrassed. I started crying. It was big by that point,” she said.

Buyalos was diagnosed with stage 3 breast cancer last June. That was with the help of Komen Columbus and OhioHealth which helped paid for the mammograms.

She lost her hair 15 days into her chemo.

Her friends and family shaved their heads.

She fights to stay positive.

“It really puts your body into a shock. And that was not fun. But at the same time, it was not bad. I kept holding myself, bracing myself for the most part.”

She was bracing for the worst.

Instead she found TLC in a dog she found on the streets. Her name is Wooley Bear.

“I just knew she was supposed to be my friend. Yes, that's right. I love her so much. She's so precious.”

Buyalos is learning to live in the moment.

“I kind of go through my list: I'm very thankful today for this and this. This is good. This is crappy. But OK.”

She said in five years she wants to be healthy and working with people to help make them healthy.

Buyalos will be 37.

“I don't know if I'll get through this and it will all catch up with me and I'll be like, Oh my, gosh. I had cancer?”

She said she has found a lot of comfort in the movie, "Crazy, Sexy Cancer."

It's billed as an irreverent and uplifting documentary about a young woman who has cancer and is looking for a cure but also trying to find life.

Buyalos friends are showing it for anyone who wants to see it at Studio 35 here in Columbus at 2 p.m. Sunday, May 24.

The public is welcome to attend.

Go to http://www.zoebuyalosfund.org/ for more information.

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