DWTS Edyta Sliwinska Shares Her Cancer Battle One Year After the Diagnosis

A Year of Gratitude After a Life-Altering Diagnosis

Last week was a very emotional and important day for Edyta Sliwinska, the professional dancer from Dancing With the Stars. One year ago to this day, a shattering diagnosis was delivered to her and she has only just survived the year. In a poignant and thoughtful Instagram post, she is sharing with us her journey from that fearful moment to the present with a thankful heart.

On August 13, she shared with her fans the incident that changed her life forever, going into detail about the terrifying surgical experience that led to waking up in a haze. “A year to the day, I woke up from a semi-conscious state,” she said, “and a man in a blue coat looked at me and said something no one ever wants to hear: ‘It’s cancer.’”

A Symbol of Strength and Survival

She admitted, that in the frightening moment, she had the unsettling idea that she might not “live to see today.” Ellen, 44, shared that she could not have fathomed how one word—cancer—would cut right through her life and change it entirely.

She now deeply feels the scar under her abdomen not as a reminder of a traumatic event but as the main, everyday reminder of just how “incredibly fragile” life is. It is a very hard and deep lesson that has made her accept ‘live as if there is no tomorrow,’ and also tell other people to love their health.

Not only that she tells. To go with her intense words, the dancer uploaded a bikini picture of her that shows the scar that tells her the story of the journey. It’s a witness to the ordeal, a visual pledge from a woman who now dubs herself “the luckiest person in the world to be here today.”

A New Lease on Life and a Shift in Perspective

Her fight against cancer was more than a mere survival, it was a complete revamp of her life. She has committed herself to making major changes in her “lifestyle, diet, environment, and exercise routine,” a process that not only made her get better but also turned her into a healthier and more aware person. With the process, she has gained a major insight that health is the most underappreciated luxury, she noted, “we only realize it when we lose it.”

In a subsequent post just two days afterward, Edyta revealed how the new recognition of her health gave her “a whole new view of life” that she shares with her husband of 18 years, Alec Mazo, and their two children, Michael, 11, and Leia, 8. The ordinary, mundane things that were once considered as nothing special are now worthy of praise.
“The point that my children are healthy and able to attend school is a blessing,” she indicated, accompanying the remark with a few adorable family shots. Not even the bustle of a jam-packed day was turned down, instead, she permitted the chaos to be a source of her joy. “The reason I have a hectic schedule with so many things to do is a blessing,” she said, “because there was a time when I was confined in bed, surviving on painkillers.”

The difference between then and now is what makes her so thankful. “A year later, I’m here, living all these wonderful moments with my family and my friends,” she reminisced. These are “times that I could not have had just a year ago… since the only thing that I thought about was cancer.”

Finding Strength in the Midst of Pain

Recalling the year 2024 just after the first operation, the celebrity Edyta did not hesitate to tell how hard was her recovery. To Edyta, the pain of the body was accompanied by the disappointment of the heart due to her incapability of being the mother she wanted. “I was in pain and confined to bed after my surgery,” she wrote at that time. “I was out of reach for my children, I couldn’t read them a story, prepare their food, or even give them a nice warm hug.”

Yet, her spirit was there even in the heaviness of the dark and painful hours. In a powerful gesture of thanksgiving and defiant spirit towards recovery, she conveyed that feeling to her fans. “The world is great in so many aspects,” she stated. “I am the one you would never want to part with and this is how I vow to live it to the full.”