Valerie Harper, who made you laugh as the smart mouth, blunt, and hilarious Rhoda Morgenstein on The Mary Tyler Moore Show, and her own spin-off show, Rhoda, has announced that she has been diagnosed with terminal brain cancer
The actress who is 73, told Today that she was told about her cancer this past January 15, and doctors have said that she has around three months to live.
The cancer has been revealed to be called, leptomeningeal carcinomatosis, which is rare and occurs when cells spread into the fluid filled membrane in the brain.
Harper who was diagnosed with lung cancer in 2009, that she was able to beat, said this;
"I don't think of dying, I think of being here now."
She has said that she was a life long smoker and that she is, "I'm well past my expiration date already."
Doctors have said that her brain cancer could stem from the lung cancer and that five percent of patients have this complication of cancer.
Valerie had experienced some symptoms that resembled a stroke and that is why she went to the Dr. in the first place.
She told Good Morning America this of what the symptoms felt like;
“It was if I had Novocain I thought what the heck is happening to me? I went to the hospital and they couldn’t find much of anything. Now I’m still awaiting test results,”
She recently got the results from those tests revealing the cancer.
Harper wrote a memoir that she promoted recently, "I, Rhoda" and she talked about her lung cancer in the book, and how she fought it and won by doing chemo and radiation.
Valerie is married with one daughter to Tony Cacciotti since 1987.
She will be doing chemo treatments once again in hopes of prolonging her life.
After doing an interview with People magazine, J. D. Heyman, executive editor of People said this about Harper;
“There are moments when she feels extremely sad. She’s also extremely funny, She’s very, very happy that she’s had the life that she had.”
Valerie has appeared on many televison shows through out the years including, The Love Boat, Sex and the City, Desperate Housewives and her most recent stint, on The Simpsons.
You can read about Valerie's fight against cancer and how she is dealing with it in this week's People on newsstands now.
We wish Valerie the best and send her our prayers.
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