Olivia Munn shares she’s been battling breast cancer for 10 months
Actress and mother Olivia Munn, 43, revealed she was diagnosed with breast cancer last year, and has undergone four surgeries during the past 10 months. She shared the news on her Instagram account, along with a statement and series of photos and a video documenting her breast cancer journey.
“In February of 2023, in an effort to be more proactive about my health, I took a genetic test that checks you for 90 cancer genes. I tested negative for all, including BRCA (the most well-known breast cancer gene),” she writes in her statement.
“My sister Sara had just tested negative as well. We called each other and high-fived over the phone. The same winter I also had a negative mammogram. Two months later I was diagnosed with breast cancer.”
“In the past ten months I have had four surgeries, so many days spent in bed I can’t even count and have learned more about cancer, cancer treatment and hormones than I could ever have imagined,” she contines. “Surprisingly, I’ve only cried twice. I guess I haven’t felt like there was time to cry. My focus narrowed and I tabled my emotions that I felt would interfere with my ability to stay clearheaded.”
Munn, who shares a two-year-old son Malcolm with her partner, comedian John Mulaney, says though she tested negative for all of those cancer genes, her doctor decided to calculate her Breast Cancer Risk Assessment Score just in case.
“The fact that she did saved my life,” Munn said, noting that her risk was calculated to be 37%. Her doctor prompted her to go for an MRI, then an ultrasound and finally a biopsy that confirmed she had Luminal B cancer in both breasts, which is an “aggressive, fast moving cancer.”
“I went from feeling completely fine one day, to waking up in a hospital bed after a 10-hour surgery the next,” she wrote. “I’m lucky. We caught it with enough time that I had options.”
She says she’s kept the diagnosis mostly under wraps to avoid making the “worry and the recovery and the pain medicine and the paper gowns” a public matter.
“I needed to catch my breath and get through some of the hardest parts before sharing.”
She goes on to thank her doctor and the medical team at Cedars Sinai and St. Johns, her friends, family, and Mulaney for taking care of her and their son—even placing a framed photo of the two of them next to her hospital bed, so they were the first thing she saw when she woke up post-surgery.
“I hope by sharing this it will help others find comfort, inspiration and support on their own journey,” she concluded.
