Abby Lee Miller‘s spirits were high when she appeared on The Doctors to discuss her battle with cancer on Sept. 10, and she managed to make an incredibly huge achievement! The 52-year-old Dance Moms star was encouraged to take her first steps in public on the show after being bound to a wheelchair for over a year, and she managed to do with an overwhelming amount of support from the doctors on the set and the studio audience. The brave coach used a walker while getting up from the wheelchair as the audience clapped and cheered and she took a couple of steps. Although she admitted it was “scary” and looked nervous, the progress she made was definitely proof that she’s determined to get stronger every day.
In addition to taking her first steps in public, Abby went on the medical series to discuss where she’s at in her recovery since being diagnosed with spinal Burkitt Lymphoma, which is a rare yet aggressive form of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, early last year. It led to her being paralyzed from the waist down and having multiple spinal surgeries, with the first one happening in Apr. 2018, and 10 rounds of chemotherapy. In May of this year, she announced that she is cancer-free but has still been working hard to walk again through rehabilitation.
During her discussion on the show, Abby revealed that both of her parents had died from cancer so it runs in her family. “I knew that I would have cancer, but I never thought at 52,” she admitted. She also went on to talk about her feelings about death and what she went through while struggling in a hospital bed. “When you’re that close to death, dying is easy. It’s very serious, but it’s easy,” she explained. “You’re laying there, filled with drugs, they’re pumping everything they can into you to keep you alive, you’re so out of it you don’t even know. I don’t know what the afterlife holds, but I might have been, you know, skinny and fabulous in the afterlife, I don’t know. But they saved me and I’m here so I have to do the best that I can and I lay in that hospital bed or in rehab and I lay there and I watch TV and I see all of these bad cartwheels in these commercials and there’s so much more work for me to do.”
Doctors also discussed how Abby underwent knee replacement surgery in July to help with her recovery process and is still doing rehab work four times a day. Although her doctors explained that Abby still has a 10-20 percent chance of the cancer coming back, her spine is currently stable and she’s doing a great job in her recovery. She also wants to use her experience to help other women out there who may be going through the same thing, especially if they feel there’s something wrong but have yet to be checked.
“I want to be an advocate and come to The Doctors and tell you my story because I think women they take care of their children first,” she said. “You know, if your kid hurts their ankle or their knee, you’re right there. You take care of your husbands, you take care of your parents, your own adult parents that are elderly, you never take care of yourself and I think it’s important for women, if they know something’s wrong, get it checked out.”
