Three surgeries and eight weeks of rehab: How White Ferns' Lea Tahuhu got through cancer scare

Lea Tahuhu is a New Zealand women's cricketer and a White Ferns' hero who recently registered her maiden five-for, her best figures in international cricket, to keep the Kiwis alive in a five-match ODI series against England. With 0-2 down in the series, Tahuhu produced a phenomenal opening spell of bowling picking up 4 wickets under the first 10 overs. This allowed the Kiwis to dominate from ball go and they pulled the series back into life clinching a win that made bold statements.

And to think that Tahuhu was almost ruled out of the White Ferns cricket tour of England. So much so that, she might even have been fighting cancer, if not for prompt action by her, her family members and doctors. The tall fast bowler had also symptoms of skin cancer, which developed through a mole on her foot. 

“It got me to some low places. It was such a shock, all of it,” Tahuhu was quoted as saying in the newsroom.co. It didn’t really bother Tahuhu for 18 months until it changed colour and started getting bigger. After constant harping by her wife and New Zealand women vice-captain Amy Satterwaithe and her mom, Tahuhu finally got the mole removed, but that’s when the real struggle began. 

“I had the mole taken off, and all went well at that point. There’s not a lot of skin on the top of your foot that you can actually pull together, so it was left a bit open,” Tahuhu reasoned after being diagnosed with an infection on her wounds while practising during a White Ferns camp

“I was seeing a plastic surgeon at 8.30 in the morning, and by 2 pm I was in for general surgery to remove all the dead bits,” she explained. 

So suddenly, the process which was to be over with the removal of the mole now stretched to another 15 days. And just as she thought it couldn't get any worse, the White Ferns player received the shock of her life. 

“I went in to have a local anaesthetic for a small graft. We were sitting in the waiting room and the doctor said to Amy and me to come down and have a chat. It was 8.25 am and I was supposed to be getting it done at 8.30, but he wasn’t in his scrubs. I should have put two and two together then,” said the 30-year-old. 

“He said ‘We won’t be doing the graft this morning because we’ve had some preliminary results back from your mole and it doesn’t look positive’,” Tahuhu added. 

Not to say she was devastated, but almost everything was about to change for the New Zealand international who has played 73 ODIs and 53 T20Is for the White Ferns in her 10-year long international career. 

“That morning then changed drastically, because it’s not often you get words such as ‘melanoma’ and ‘skin cancer’ thrown at you, that you certainly weren’t expecting. I sat there like a stunned mullet.

“What was supposed to be one local surgery and two weeks recovery, ended up being three surgeries and eight weeks later,” she said. 

However, another round of tests confirmed that she had a close shave as the mole was almost entering the cancerous stage when she arrived at the doctors and thus cancerous cells hadn’t really developed. 

“Anytime someone throws the word ‘melanoma’ at you it gets pretty scary, pretty real, very fast. I’m very lucky that’s not what it ended up being, but there were a scary few days there. It was tough,” she said. 

However, on one hand, there was something to relax about, but on the other, the fast bowler was worried about missing the plane to England. 

“There were a few days where I thought ‘How am I going to put ten times my body weight through my foot when I bowl? When at the moment I’ve just got a hole on the side of it,’” said Tahuhu who has taken a total of 129 international wickets. 

“But then I thought ‘No, I’m determined to get on that plane’, and I’m pretty diligent with what I have to get done to reach goals,” she added. And she indeed made it to the plane and has now even won a game for her team in a crunch situation. 

Tahuhu went on to thank her family and friends for taking care of her and her daughter Grace when her wife Satterwaithe was out training with the national team. She also thanked New Zealand Cricket for being with her through all this.

“We’re so lucky to have family support around us so Amy could still go off to train while parents and siblings came round to look after both Grace and me for a change. 

New Zealand Cricket have been amazing, they took over the full rehab and worked with the doctors in Christchurch really closely so I could get on the plane,” Tahuhu said, but not before advising people not to take their health for granted. 

“I certainly won’t be taking any skin checks or mole maps for granted anymore. I’ll be one of the people who’s getting one every year on the date it’s needed,” she said.