Nigerian writer and cancer advocate Gloria Chinyere Okwu has shared her deeply personal breast cancer story, reflecting on her diagnosis, mastectomy, treatment, and the stigma surrounding the disease in Nigeria. Writing for The Guardian, Okwu recounts being diagnosed with breast cancer in 2017 at the age of 32 and the difficult decisions that followed, including her initial refusal of chemotherapy and eventual return to medical treatment after the cancer recurred.

Okwu also writes about the pressure many Nigerian women face to keep their diagnoses private or turn to prayer, traditional medicine, and alternative treatments. Since 2022, she has publicly shared photographs of her mastectomy scars on social media, using her experience to challenge the shame and silence surrounding breast cancer while encouraging other women to confront changes to their bodies without losing their sense of self-worth.

Okwu is the author of On Close Examination, published by Ouida Books, and has become a prominent voice in cancer advocacy. Nine years after her diagnosis, her decision to make her scars and survival part of a public conversation continues to challenge the secrecy surrounding breast cancer and amplify the experiences of women living with the disease in Nigeria and beyond.

To read the essay, click here.

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