'No Regrets:' Oklahoma City Woman Finds Hope In Battle With Breast Cancer

An Oklahoma City metro grandmother says she understands the importance of routine cancer screenings, and hopes her experience will help others catch cancer early.

Breast cancer survivor Diana Faris shared her journey and her message of gratitude, and said the way people spend their days makes the time count.  

“I think the biggest thing is just to find the positive,” Faris said. “I have to stop and remind myself what I have done and what I am able to do.” 

Faris said she fights for every second, but her two grandchildren preserve her youth. 

“Wouldn’t trade it for the world,” Faris said. 

Faris’s husband Bruce Faris served in the U.S. Air Force, and the couple returned to Oklahoma in 2007, which is when Faris received her first diagnosis. 

“I noticed something did not look right on my left breast,” Faris said. 

Faris said she needed many treatments and a lot of care.  

“After my mastectomy, I did eight chemotherapy treatments, thirty-five radiation treatments, followed with the hysterectomy,” she said. 

Cancer changes a person mentally and physically, but Faris's treatment worked for a period. 

“Thought we were good,” Faris said. 

However, at a doctor's visit in April, Faris said she found out her cancer had returned. This time, it spread to her liver and her bones. 

“My mindset was that I was gonna get antibiotics and be sent home, ‘surprise,’” Faris said. “This is not something that is going to be healed.” 

But for Faris, she said she doesn’t worry, but that she lives her life. 

“Finding one thing in my day that I'm grateful for,” Faris said. “The simplest things.” 

Her new treatment keeps her moving and is less taxing on her body. 

“Feeling a little bit better day by day,” Faris said. 

She keeps her schedule full, but it shows her what’s possible. 

“A lot of calendars with a lot of ink marks,” Faris said. 

Instead of worrying about the time she has left, because Faris said she has the time right now. 

“Just keep going,” Faris said. Count our blessings for what we have been given. Let’s go have fun. No regrets.” 

Faris received her treatment at Integris Health, and she encourages all women to get their recommended annual mammograms to hopefully catch the cancer earlier than she did.