In a sad Instagram post on Tuesday, Shannen Doherty disclosed that the breast cancer she has been battling for years had spread to her brain.
Numerous celebrities and cancer sufferers expressed their support and encouragement in response to the announcement.
“On January 5th, my scan showed Mets in my brain,” the actress, captioned a video of her receiving radiation.
“My fear is obvious. I am extremely claustrophobic and there was a lot going on in my life,” said Doherty, 52. “But that fear…. The turmoil….. the timing of it all…. This is what cancer can look like.”
Actor and longtime friend Selma Blair commented on the post: “This is a lot to take on, still again. And I am wishing for all the wise peace you have learned to find you in the terror moments. To know we are holding you. Love. All love.”
“You are a warrior,” wrote Sarah Michelle Gellar, another close friend of Doherty’s.
Since her initial diagnosis in 2015, Doherty has fought breast cancer. She claimed to have had a mastectomy, as well as chemotherapy and radiation treatments. In 2017, Doherty declared she was in remission.
But in 2020, she went public with a second diagnosis of breast cancer, this time stage 4.
Throughout the years, Doherty has candidly documented her journey living with cancer.
In October 2021, she posted a selfie of her lying in bed with a shaved head and a nosebleed.
“For breast cancer awareness month, I’d like to share more of my own personal journey from my first diagnosis to my second. Is it all pretty? NO but it’s truthful,” she wrote.
“I hope I encourage people to get mammograms, to get regular checkups, to cut thru the fear and face whatever might be in front of you.”
Shannen Doherty is an American actress. She is known for her many roles in television and film, including as Jenny Wilder in Little House on the Prairie (1982–1983); Maggie Malene in Girls Just Want to Have Fun (1985); Kris Witherspoon in Our House (1986–1988); amongst others.
Doherty was raised as a Southern Baptist by her mother after being born in Memphis, Tennessee. In 1982, Doherty made cameo appearances on TV shows like Voyagers! and Father Murphy, which Michael Landon conceived and produced.
The same year, Landon’s Little House on the Prairie, which Doherty, then 11, starred in and produced, awarded her the recurring character of Jenny Wilder.
Doherty appeared in every episode of the show’s last season, which ended in 1983 with the exception of four. In 1982, Doherty provided the voice for the animated movie The Secret of NIMH.
She had an appearance in an episode of Magnum, P.I. (“A Sense of Debt”) before making an early appearance in an episode of Airwolf, for which she received a nomination at the 6th Youth in Film Awards in 1984 for Best Young Actress: Guest in a Series.
Doherty’s debut leading role in a major motion picture was in the 1988 dark comedy Heathers. Her breakthrough performance as Brenda Walsh in the Aaron Spelling-produced television series Beverly Hills, 90210 in 1990 brought her international fame and notice.
