Six weeks after Sandra Hutchens announced she had breast cancer, the first female sheriff in Orange County Tuesday that she has undergone three rounds of chemotherapy, a lumpectomy is set for mid-February and the tumor she found on her own is getting smaller.

"The news that, yes, it's getting softer, it's shrinking. Wow, that was good news," Hutchens said.

Hutchens vowed to continue working despite the diagnosis.


"Nobody wants to sit home and let your mind go to that dark place, which it will if you just sit home and just think about it," she said.


A mammogram six months prior to her diagnosis found nothing, she said during her formal announcement on Nov. 26. Hutchens found the two-centimeter lump herself, and said doctors believe it was found early and is treatable.

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