Cancer Treatment Saved Shauna Rae's Life When She Was Just a Baby
Shauna Rae's condition and its treatment stunted her growth as an infant. The TLC collection, 'I Am Shauna Rae,' highlights her journey as an adult.
TLC's fact series, I Am Shauna Rae, follows the titular 23-year-old, who appears many years younger than she is. The truth big name explains she is "stuck" within the frame of an 8-year-old, which makes it difficult to totally live as an independent grownup.
The sequence follows Shauna as she lives her life — getting a tattoo, drinking alcohol, taking pole-dancing classes, and going on dates — and ceaselessly showcases the shocked reactions of the ones round her who are shocked to see somebody who seems like a child enticing in the ones activities.
The TLC collection has been fast to capture audience, and plenty of are curious to be told more about Shauna Rae's situation. Keep reading for the whole thing we know.
Shauna Rae's clinical situation: Why did she prevent growing?
Shauna was just 6 months old when she was diagnosed with brain cancer. As a baby, she had surgical operation and underwent chemotherapy with the intention to prevent the cancer from rising. While the remedies have been successful in saving her life and surroundings the cancer into remission, the chemo also affected her pituitary gland, which was "rendered almost dormant" and consequently, irrevocably stunted her enlargement.
According to the Mayo Clinic, the pituitary gland is a "small, bean-shaped gland" in the brain that "despite its small size, influences nearly every part" of the frame. Most significantly, the hormones produced via one's pituitary gland control enlargement, blood pressure, and copy.
It would seem that the medical term for Shauna's situation is "pituitary dwarfism," aka "growth hormone deficiency" and "dwarfism," which happens when the pituitary gland does not make sufficient growth hormone, consistent with Johns Hopkins Medicine and Kids Health. Growth hormone deficiency may also be congenital (provide at start) or received, meaning it develops later.
Shauna's case seems to fall into the latter category. It wasn't until the age of 16 that the TLC famous person discovered she would not develop past her 3-foot-10-inch frame. "It was a very difficult time, it probably was the lowest time of my life because I always imagined that I would be tall. Getting that news was kind of like a hammer crashing into glass," Shauna said in a video interview with People.
Shauna explained that whilst she's felt like an interloper since early formative years, the TLC series has opened her eyes to the truth that there are lots of others like her. "When the trailer came out, it was kind of like I was worldwide almost overnight," she instructed E! Online. "People have reached out to me; I have found other people with pituitary dwarfism, and it's really not only helped me, but helped them because now we know that we're not alone."
Shauna's mom worries her mind cancer is returning.
In Season 1 of I Am Shauna Rae, Shauna and her family had been fearful that her cancer might be returning. Shauna's doctor referred her to a neurologist for her frequent migraines, with a purpose to rule out the potential of the complications being symptomatic of her cancer returning.
"After Shauna's surgery to remove the cancer, there was still more left — they couldn't get it all — so she had to do chemotherapy and you hope that it takes care of it all, you never know," her mother, Patty, advised cameras. "But they did let me know that it would always be a concern, that it may come back."
Ultimately, the cancer scare was just that in the interim: a scare. Hopefully, Shauna's migraines have subsided so she can focus on dwelling her highest life — now that she's left the nest and moved to the city!
Season 2 of I Am Shauna Rae premiered on Nov. 1, 2022. Catch new episodes at 10 p.m. EST on TLC, and on the Discovery Plus app.
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