Good Morning America anchor and former NFL player Michael Strahan revealed on Thursday’s show that his daughter, 19 was recently diagnosed with medulloblastoma.
Medulloblastoma is a rare form of brain cancer.
“I’m very proud of her and she’s always been strong and this is something that is so personal that I didn’t know if it would be something that she’d want to share,” Strahan said.
But Isabella, his daughter decided to share her story.
According to her, she started experiencing extreme headaches, as well as nausea and an inability to walk straight.
At first, she thought she had vertigo. But in late October, she began vomiting blood. She texted her twin sister Sophia, who informed the rest of the family.
Her father Michael took her to the doctor.
Isabella’s MRI results showed a fast-growing, four centimeter brain tumor that was larger than a golf ball. She had an emergency surgery to remove the tumor.
But she has completed her radiation treatment and will begin chemotherapy at Duke University in February, she said.
Isabella was in rehabilitation for a month and had to learn to walk again.
“I’m very excited for this whole process to wrap, but you just have to keep living every day, I think, through the whole thing,” she said.
She has started a YouTube channel to document her journey through vlogs, or video blogs.
“It’s been like two months of keeping it quiet, which is definitely difficult,” Isabell said.
“Perspective is a big thing,” Isabella said. “I’m grateful just to walk or see friends or do something, cause when you can’t do something, it really impacts you.”
Michael has admitted that the experience changed his perspective.
“I literally think that, in a lot of ways, I’m the luckiest man in the world because I got an amazing daughter, and I know she’s going through it, but I know that we’re never given more than we can handle, and that she is gonna crush this.” He added: “I need her. I don’t know what I would do without her.”
