Lucan woman shares ovarian cancer journey hoping to save other women

CTV London’s Lauren Stallone speaks to a local woman who was diagnosed with ovarian cancer and now advocates for screening tests.

Linda Barr is always looking for the beautiful things in life, most recently through watercolour painting.

“Art has always been part of my life, but this development of painting has really evolved and grown in this time period,” said Barr.

The pastime taught her to embrace the unpredictable nature of watercolour and its imperfections, much like life itself.

“This is my therapy,” she said.

What Barr didn’t know was that she’d need to apply that lesson beyond the canvas.

“I had pain in my lower pelvic area, and I was telling our trainer in Lucan,” said Barr. “I said, ‘At first I was blaming you I had pulled a muscle,’ but it didn’t turn out to be a pulled muscle, it turned out to be something else.”

Originally thought to be diverticulitis, Barr was awaiting instruction from her doctor. But in June of 2023, she received a phone call that would change her life forever.

“He said we got the results back from your CT scan,” said Barr. “It’s not diverticulitis, it’s cancer.”

Barr was diagnosed with late-stage ovarian cancer.

“I never said, ‘Why me?’” said Barr. “Because why not?”

Like Barr, most women with ovarian cancer continue to be diagnosed late and it has the lowest survival rates of all genealogical cancers.

“There’s a lot of room in the pelvis that things can grow before it causes any symptoms and the early symptoms tend to be very vague and non-specific,” said Dr. Allan Covens in gynecologic oncology at Sunnybrook Health Science Centre.

Experts say this year, 3,000 women will learn they have ovarian cancer and half will die within five years.

“Some of those patients can be cured,” said Covens. “But the cure rates tend to be very low.”

To mark World Ovarian Cancer Day on May 8, Barr shared her story in hopes of saving other women.

“Ovarian cancer hasn’t received enough attention, there’s no diagnostic that can pick it up early,” said Barr. “There is no screening like pap smears or mammograms.”

While progress is being made in the fight against cancer, with the recent survival rates at 63 per cent compared to 25 per cent in the 1940s, more needs to be done to prevent ovarian cancer deaths.

“We continue to make progress, but we aren’t hitting home runs,” said Covens. “We’re hitting singles.”

Barr just finished treatment and is taking life one day at a time.

“It’s not if it comes back,” said Barr. “It’s when it comes back.”

Like her artwork, Barr believes you can find beauty in anything, even life’s most unexpected journeys.

“I did a painting of a map of Canada and a wavering line of women holding hands because that’s what it feels like,” Barr.