Make wishtv.com your home page

Central Indiana woman describes 16-year journey battling fibroids

INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — Fibroids can have devastating impacts, and in the worse cases, put someone’s life at risk. After countless fibroids and seven surgeries, one central Indiana woman has gotten her life back.

Shellie Canady’s fibroid journey started in 1995, not getting relief until 16 years later. She remembers her mother having them so she knew what they were. But getting rid of them and putting her body back together has been a journey she never saw coming. And she is now sharing her story hoping to spare someone else.

“I ended up having a bile obstruction because all of the scar tissue wrapped around my intestines,” Canady said. “So they had to remove about 18 inches of my intestines.”

That’s what happened during Canady’s seventh surgery to repair the damage fibroids had caused over the years. On a mission to save her uterus to one day birth children, she had the first surgery in 1995.

“A few years later, I want to say in the early 2000s, they came back with a vengeance. And so I had to have another myomectomy in 2002,” she said.

That also didn’t work, so in 2004, she tried a new surgery where doctors went through her leg and thigh to cut off the fibroids’ blood supply.

Again, it didn’t work. With the fibroids coming back worse than before, she let go of the dream of bearing children.

“I’m still a mom. I adopted my daughter when she was five. And she’s now 25. So, that’s been great. And I am a school teacher. So I have taught in 25 years over 500 kids. So although I didn’t have children the natural way, God blessed me to be able to mother children at school and mother my own child,” Canady said.

In 2007, she opted for a hysterectomy, leaving an ovary behind. That one ovary started producing a different type of tumor. It was not life-threatening this time, but still painful.

“My OB-GYN had to end up taking my appendix because those tumors went to my appendix,” she said.

After many after many surgeries, scar tissue wrapped around her intestines, forcing doctors to perform one final surgery.

“So yeah, it was big ordeal,” she said. “But since then, no issues.”

For Canady, this has been a life-long journey and she hopes sharing her story helps someone else.