Kyedae opens up on cancer diagnosis, admits she kept it a secret from Tenz

Valorant superstar Kyedae “Kyedae” Shymko opened up about her cancer diagnosis in a recent Twitch stream where she admitted she kept it secret from her fiance, TenZ, so he could focus on VCT LOCK//IN. 

Kyedae is essentially Valorant royalty at this point. She is one of the most followed streamers in the scene, with a loyal fan base behind her and she is also engaged to Sentinel’s star player Tyson “TenZ” Ngo.

So when she announced she was diagnosed with Leukemia last week, the entire community gave their wholehearted support to the queen of Valorant. Despite her diagnosis, however, she announced plans to continue streaming through the treatment, and has followed through on that with multiple broadcasts already. In her initial comeback stream following the announcement, she explained more about her new situation. 

Although the news was grave, Kyedae still kept her stream light and breezy as it normally is, even poking fun at her own diagnosis at times and admitting she had no idea how to talk about it. “When I found out I had cancer, I actually just laughed,” she said on stream.

“I apologize if I trigger any of you, or make any of you feel uncomfortable, but all I’ve been doing during this is laughing,” she continued. “Because let’s be real here, if I get sad and then go ‘oh I have cancer,’ it’s not going to go poof and go away.”

She then opened up on the diagnosis itself, revealing she didn’t tell anybody about it when she first received the news. In fact, “not even [her] mom or dad” were informed right away. Her fiance Tenz was also kept out of the loop “until after his tournament,” she added. “Because I just wanted to make sure he was fully focused on his game and his work before I broke the news.”

Kyedae also gave an update on her treatment to her viewers, saying her chemotherapy will most likely cause hair loss before long. Even just a few days into treatment and the beloved content creator is already feeling side effects with various health complications, though she’s continuing to push through and stream to her audience for now.

Despite the grave news, she added she doesn’t want her audience to see her any differently. Saying in the stream, “honestly, don’t treat me any differently, treat me like a normal person.”

As a result, Kyedae still plans on streaming regularly moving forward, but she admitted the schedule will be much more irregular as her treatment advances.