Mom Gets Foot Amputated After Discovering Tumor During Pedicure

A North Carolina mother of two made the decision to have her foot amputated after discovering a tumor during a pedicure.

Jenn Andrews, 33, a mother of a 4-year-old and a 3-year-old, is recovering after having her right leg amputated below the shin after she discovered a pea-sized lump on her foot during a pedicure, PEOPLE reports.

Andrews’ ordeal began in 2013 when her pedicurist noticed a small nodule on the top of her right foot. Pregnant with her first child, and not thinking anything of it, she decided to not do anything about it. After she gave birth, however, Andrews had the nodule removed, with tests later revealing that it was a cancerous tumor.

Doctors diagnosed Andrews with low-grade myxoid sarcoma, a rare and slow-growing tumor that has the potential to spread and can be fatal. Despite regular checkups after the tumor was removed, it eventually grew back in January, and doctors told her that if she never wanted to deal with the cancer again, she would have to have her right foot amputated.

“You should think about your children and watching your kids walk down the aisle and if that’s the most important thing in your life, then you should have an amputation,” Dr. Joshua Patt, an orthopedic oncologist at Levine Cancer Center, told Andrews.

His words seemed to bear heavy on Andrews, who, after many late nights spent talking over the decision with her husband, decided to go through with the procedure and have her foot amputated.

“I did this because I love life. I’m not one to miss out on life. I have a 3-year-old and a 4-year-old who I love more than you can love someone else and the idea of them growing up without me just broke my heart. Anything I could do to be there for them, I was willing to do — and that’s what I did,” she said.

Andrews, a health and wellness coach, wanted to turn her experience into something positive, even telling her doctor that she wanted “to be the one you send your patients to when they are in this situation and need someone to talk to.” Before her surgery, Andrews took the first steps into turning the matter into a positive experience, posting a video to Facebook asking people to #MoveforJenn.

While Andrews was in surgery on March 12, people in her hometown and across the country took her message to heart, tagging her in pictures on social media of them doing everything from walking to running.

“When I woke up from surgery my Facebook and Instagram was flooded with #MoveForJenn posts and I can’t put into words what it meant to me to see that so many people got moving,” Andrews said.

Andrews is now waiting to get her first prosthetic foot and has set up a GoFundMe account to help pay for what her insurance will not cover. While hoping to take her first steps in the next few days, she has already set a goal to run a 5k by the end of the year.