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Doctors have successfully removed a giant tumor that weighed 35.3 pounds from the abdomen of a Peruvian woman in the capital city of Lima.

The Peruvian Health Ministry reported that the woman, 22-year-old Irianita Rojas, had been living with the ovarian tumor since she was 13. As the tumor continued to grow, it started to impair her ability to breathe, walk and sleep. She also looked like she was heavily pregnant.

"It's as if she were pregnant, but twice the size," the director at the Archbishop Loayza National Hospital, Dr. Luis Garcia Bernal, told Reuters. "The tumor was approximately 50 centimeters (19.6 inches) in diameter."

Dr. Bernal added Wednesday that Rojas is staying in Lima for observation. Rojas underwent the three-hour long surgery on Saturday.

"Irianita is recovering and can be released, but she will stay in Lima for a few more days to so that we can practice additional exams to define the treatment she should follow when she returns to (the province of) Loreto," he said reported by CNN.

Although Rojas will not be able to return home to the remote town of Tamshiyacu just yet, she is happy that the tumor is finally gone.

"I never thought I would be operated on," Rojas said in the Health Ministry's press release. "I'm happy now because I'm recovering and I will be able to fulfill my dream of studying accounting."

Rojas's mother, Karina Rasma, also thanked the doctors "for giving [her] daughter a new life."

Rojas had believed that she was going to have to live with the tumor for the rest of her life since. Fortunately for Her, health minister Anibal Velasquez Valdivia heard about her case during a visit within the region.

Valdivia immediately made plans for Rojas and her mother to be flown to Lima, where she could get medical attention. Upon her arrival at the hospital, the doctors determined that surgery should be performed right away.

Although the tumor was malignant, the doctors stated that Rojas is expected to make a full recovery.