I do not have all the answers. I write about my life experience with breast cancer and as a survivor. a great deal of what I write is opinion, capice? As in my opinion, my thoughts. You can like or leave my opinions, your choice. I always answer honestly to the best of my ability.
Today someone left me a comment on a Tamoxifen post about their “niece”. Apparently this woman lost her job, is going through a divorce, and either isn’t eligible for COBRA health benefits or can’t afford them. So this “aunt” asked me what should she do because she takes Tamoxifen.
So I said (at first) a lot of people can get COBRA. Which is true. I also said a lot of states offer benefits or access to assistance (which is true). I also suggested a couple of non-profits that I see giving grants or stipends or whatever you call it to BC people . I also suggested that this woman tell her “niece” to go to her doctors and ask them – I know darn well that many doctors will try to help steer them towards sources for aid so that patients stay on meds. Or of course this woman could check pharmaceutical companies that produce Tamoxifen to see who has what kind of a reduced cost availability, etc. I also did say that this “niece” had to learn to be her own advocate. That is entirely true.
But no……this woman did not like anything I had to say. I am guessing I was supposed to have all the answers, or get out my checkbook?
I am full on Tamoxifen cranky in the mood department today, but you know what? I don’t need this crap.
I wish I had all the answers, but I don’t. What I do know is I cannot be all things to all people. Nor should I be expected to be as such.
When I get comments like this woman it is offensive enough to make me want to make this blog go dark.
Nothing stirs a debate more amongst breast cancer previvors and survivors more than what to do with the “girls”. It is a truly boobylicious debate.
Do you wear your chest flat and proud, lopsided and loving it (that would be me although some days I don’t love it so much), or proud reconstructed glory?
And then of course there is always the sub-debate which goes on between previvors who popped on some genetic test and decided to have a preventative mastectomy (or they did it plain and simple because of an overwhelming familial history of breast cancer) and us survivors who have actually had and been treated for the disease known as breast cancer.
Some women show their scars proudly, some hide that they even ever had the disease. There is no right or wrong, it is personal choice and our individual bodies. I know some women who have gotten all sorts of tattoos involving breast cancer, I even remember reading the blog of a woman who did beautiful temporary henna tattoo art on her head while she was bald during chemotherapy.
So this woman Melissa who is on a BC board with me decided to do her own personal SCAR Project and had Rebellious Tony Ink Couture of Staten Island (that’s a mouthful LOL) tattoo a perfect black bra on her reconstructed breasts. It’s not for everyone, but it sure seems to have stirred debate.
Look, it is her body, her choice. She is choosing not to hide, but instead to celebrate. She also likes tattoos and wanted to further express herself and her femininity and her strength.I say good for her for doing something for herself. File this under You Go Girl!
Melissa wrote to me when I asked if I could share her story:
My back story is I was diagnosed at the age of 34. I had just delivered twins 7 months before my diagnosis, I lost my daughter and my son survived. Thinking I has just had a baby they assumed I was estrogen positive. No, I am triple negative with 3 lymph nodes positive. I never wanted fake tattooed nipples as cancer had taken mine so I waited 7 years to decide what I wanted. I have not worn a bra so I thought I want a black lace bra, nothing like that to make you feel sexy. So I found an artist from NYC and I got a bra. I would love for you to share it and I don’t mind you using my name. Much love ❤ Melissa
Me? I can appreciate tattoo art, but you won’t see me getting them because I just don’t dig needles. As for lop-sided boobies? Well what is important to me is that I am alive. Plastic surgery is also not for me.
But my personal choices with regards to life as a breast cancer survivor are not ones I will foist on others, and I think Melissa did a cool thing. I am sharing the photo. If I find that people are just taking it to put on fake websites and whatnot, I will remove it.
I am also going to get on my soapbox for a minute – I think it is prudent to point out that we of the breast cancer sisterhood are a very diverse group: different races, ethnicities, from literally all over the globe. Some of us are survivors, some of us are just beginning the journey, and some of us are BRCA positive previvors.
Some of us have had partial mastectomies to remove tumors. Some of us have had full and double mastectomies to either remove tumors or as a preventative measure. We all handle it differently, and I think we need to put aside the visceral reaction to scars and see the beauty in survival.
We all handle our journey differently, and it is not my place to judge. I will say however, that have noticed a lot of people being hard on others in the sisterhood for whatever reason. And I will expand on that thought by saying that I think a lot of cases people don’t realize they’re being hard on others.
When you are on the journey of breast cancer, and whatever path that journey takes you, it is nearly impossible to be positive and happy every day. That is just reality. But as a wise friend told me when I was beginning my journey, some days you need to have those down times so you can climb out on the other side of the mountain and regain your positivity.
Life is not a sappy Hallmark card, but I do think some days as survivors and previvors we should learn to be kinder to one and other.
I don’t often throw a Bible verse up anywhere but I am
doing so today.
Luke 6:37:
“Judge not, and you will not be judged; condemn not, and you will not be condemned; forgive, and you will be forgiven;
Two weeks ago I began my next round of check-ups. Once you have had a breast cancer diagnosis and received treatment, you do have to be diligent with your health. After all if you aren’t going to treat yourself well, who will?
Anyway, as is the norm for now, I am still anxious the night before any test or doctor’s appointment. I can’t wait for the day when the anxiety I never had prior to breast cancer disappears.
Fortunately for me, everything is fine in my world. I am one of the lucky ones. I have had two friends who have had recurrences in the past few months, so I know I am blessed.
But I am to experience more medical changes. One of my doctors, dare I say my favorite doctor, is leaving the area. She is going to New York. She is going to Cornell/New York Presbyterian and aren’t they lucky to get her. Her career star will shine even brighter I am sure!
I managed to retain my composure while she was telling me her news, but when I got out to the parking lot after my appointment I sat in my car and cried like a baby for a couple of minutes. I know people must have thought I received a horrible diagnosis or something, but change although a part of life is sometimes not easy.
I am thrilled for her happiness and good fortune, but sad for me. She has been my doctor for a long time and seen me through a lot, including breast cancer. It was her gentle pushing that got me the testing I needed to correctly diagnose my breast cancer.
More in the change category – my friend Melinda has finished chemo and soon will begin radiation. I am so proud and in awe of her. She is so positive and moving forward.
My life with my sweet man also continues forward. I am so grateful that our life paths led us to each other. I can’t even articulate how I love him and our life. My life could have been so different (and almost was), and my life with him is so happy. We have been in our new home a few months now and I love it! I have a huge garden and have filled a lot of summer days digging in the dirt. I know what it is to be truly loved. And appreciated and respected.
My life in Chester County continues to evolve and I continue to meet really nice people. Some of my friends venture out from where I used to live (the Main Line of Philadelphia) to go exploring with me, but in some cases I am just letting some people go slowly.
Sadly, there are some people with whom I used to speak every single day who have done the whole out of sight out of mind thing to such an extent that I am just moving on. Everyone has busy lives, but face it in this era of modern communication even if you are busy and don’t have time for a chat it takes two seconds to check in. I have come to the realization with some that as long as I was conveniently located and a devoted audience all was good. Not saying that to be mean, but with some people, they just can make that effort and hell, I am two old for any more one-sided relationships.
I was fortunate to be in one area I liked so much for so long, but sometimes the commonality you have with people just dies when you move. It’s life, and life is about change and evolution and how you handle and embrace both. I chose to be forward-looking, forward-thinking and positive. If those people want to come check out where I am now and how my life is, I will welcome them. If not, it was nice knowing them when I did.
Maybe if I was a purely self-focused to the point of selfish kind of person I would not even think about these things, but I do. And it is hard when you have to realize and accept that some people were only destined to be short-term players in your life show.
One amusing thing that happened recently that I would like to share. I wrote something that was locally controversial. I received a flurry of comments and criticisms and I quipped to someone off blog at one point that I had survived breast cancer, that this too shall pass. (Or something to that effect.) The response?
Why do you always bring up cancer? I survived invasive and aggressive breast, colon and melanoma cancers…so what?
So I did not know we were playing a game of cancer one-upmanship, but I kind of admire this person for being so strong. And they live their life to the fullest and without regrets.
However, that being said, I don’t “always” bring up cancer. It is however, part of my everyday world now that I have had it and lost people I cared about to it. It is also the hardest thing I have ever gone through personally in 49 years on this planet. So like it or not, I gauge things at times by having survived breast cancer.
That is the funny thing about women who have had breast cancer. There are a million attitudes about it positive and negative. Some people like to pretend it never existed as if that acknowledgement takes away its power. Personally? I feel being positive and being able to talk and joke about it takes away its power. I don’t discuss it with every person I meet, but it is now part of who I am and my life experiences. So I don’t hide it. I also don’t mention it for the sympathy vote. I am proud I dealt with it and came through the other side relatively unscathed. I think that is a huge accomplishment.
And I guess still the best advice I can give someone facing this as a newbie other than knowledge is power and be your own best advocate is to be open and be positive about it. If other people are uncomfortable about your discussing it, that is their issue as far as I am concerned. Brewing and stewing only creates stress. Stress aids cancer, so remove the stress.
The other thing is accept that you can and should make life changes. I have made quite a few, and it includes being lucky enough to get out of the Financial Services Industry that although at times was quite exciting and fun, was always incredibly stressful. Other changes? I have never been known for being shy but when people are ridiculous now to me, I feel free to tell them how I feel and then walk away. I am my own power.
In a sense, having breast cancer freed me for the life I wanted to have. So at the end of the day: life is short. Carpe diem.
So my friend Melinda is going thru treatment, which includes chemotherapy. At the end of June when the fun and frolic with chemicals really kicked in she posted a photo of her “new ‘do” with the following comment:
Here I Is!!! Bald! There I was, head of full hair, wedding day. Big change!!! Hopefully, the hair will grow in nice and dark so that I don’t have to dye it blond to cover the greys. Oh well. Who ever doesn’t like it can kiss it. LOL!
She channelled her inner Geralyn Lucas and found a fabulous shade of pink to go with her chemo fashion.
As a breast cancer survivor, I am very proud of her for her positive attitude and amazing resilience. Some of you might not get that but I think she’s rocking it.
You go girl!
Recently my friend Gwen, another refugee from Camp Breast Cancer celebrated a one year anniversary of being done with treatment.
Gwen is one of those awesome women you can go to for a dose of positive and a reality check because I just so appreciate her ability to tell it like it is (well she is a writer!)
So Gwen, this post is for you too!
You go girl!
So people out there how do you measure brave? I measure brave in part by the fabulous women I know who are refugees from Camp Breast Cancer.
Today is also a day that I ask you to pause and remember those who have gone before us. It is not a cause to be sad, it is a reason to celebrate for they shared their joy with us. In that vein I send a little shout out to my friend Nicki for her beautiful tribute to her friends Linda and May today.
There is only so much in life we can control, and we have to be grateful for the gifts we are given. Easier said than done given the dynamic of the glass half full versus half empty. And that is a struggle we all experience on occasion if we are honest with ourselves.
I am going to close this brief post to let you all know I am well. I am happy, and healthy, and blessed. I have been gardening like a fiend as well!
Prayers and thoughts of positive healing everything are in order for my friend Melinda. She started chemo and then she has radiation. I also have another friend who is a little more private who has had a hiccup in the form of a recurrence of sorts. Give these ladies the Irish Insurance they deserve. Pray it up people!
My only pink-ish photo right now is the Got Pole pole dancing place off South Street in Philadelphia. LOL
Anyway, I was interviewed recently for an article for Living Beyond Breast Cancer’s newsletter and I will embed it here so people can read it if they so choose.
This week another woman I know joined the breast cancer club. Soon she starts radiation. She is calm and positive which I love to see. Someone else I know had their surgery earlier this week, so the cycle keeps on going.
And as Angelina Jolie said earlier this week:
Life comes with many challenges. The ones that should not scare us are the ones we can take on and take control of.
By now my new friend Melinda should hopefully be through her breast cancer surgery.
In the supermarket this morning the man behind me was buying a Happy Anniversary balloon and a beautiful and giant bouquet of white and yellow roses – today is their anniversary.
The last sentence in her essay (which I will share an excerpt of at the bottom) hit home. She said:
Life comes with many challenges. The ones that should not scare us are the ones we can take on and take control of.
Her words are quite profound, and I will be honest I found tears running down my face after I finished reading what she had written. It is no secret I am often critical of celebrities and how they treat breast cancer. Not so with Angelina. I can only applaud her for the raw honesty and dignity in how she has treated this. I know quite a few previvors and they are amazing and brave women.
So my birthday today has been full of many signs. I see them as all positive. They seem to show me quite a few stages of life and the reality therein. Some could take them as negative given the fact a woman I know had breast cancer surgery earlier this morning and I saw a funeral cortege pass by me, but why? I see it as positive that Melinda is dealing with her cancer and that she is having surgery at a low stage. As for the funeral cortege, in the midst of sadness is the ultimate celebration of life. Yes we mourn when someone passes, but we also celebrate who they were and how they touched our lives, don’t we?
It’s like today I bore witness to all these vignettes of life and how is that a bad thing? After all, my life is so much better than it was, so how can I complain?
Today I begin my 49th year. I am hopeful it will be the best yet!
MY MOTHER fought cancer for almost a decade and died at 56. She held out long enough to meet the first of her grandchildren and to hold them in her arms. But my other children will never have the chance to know her and experience how loving and gracious she was.
We often speak of “Mommy’s mommy,” and I find myself trying to explain the illness that took her away from us. They have asked if the same could happen to me. I have always told them not to worry, but the truth is I carry a “faulty” gene, BRCA1, which sharply increases my risk of developing breast cancer and ovarian cancer.
My doctors estimated that I had an 87 percent risk of breast cancer and a 50 percent risk of ovarian cancer….Once I knew that this was my reality, I decided to be proactive and to minimize the risk as much I could. I made a decision to have a preventive double mastectomy. I started with the breasts, as my risk of breast cancer is higher than my risk of ovarian cancer, and the surgery is more complex.
On April 27, I finished the three months of medical procedures that the mastectomies involved. During that time I have been able to keep this private and to carry on with my work.
But I am writing about it now because I hope that other women can benefit from my experience. Cancer is still a word that strikes fear into people’s hearts, producing a deep sense of powerlessness. But today it is possible to find out through a blood test whether you are highly susceptible to breast and ovarian cancer, and then take action….I wanted to write this to tell other women that the decision to have a mastectomy was not easy. But it is one I am very happy that I made. My chances of developing breast cancer have dropped from 87 percent to under 5 percent. I can tell my children that they don’t need to fear they will lose me to breast cancer.
It is reassuring that they see nothing that makes them uncomfortable. They can see my small scars and that’s it. Everything else is just Mommy, the same as she always was. And they know that I love them and will do anything to be with them as long as I can. On a personal note, I do not feel any less of a woman. I feel empowered that I made a strong choice that in no way diminishes my femininity…For any woman reading this, I hope it helps you to know you have options. I want to encourage every woman, especially if you have a family history of breast or ovarian cancer, to seek out the information and medical experts who can help you through this aspect of your life, and to make your own informed choices…..I choose not to keep my story private because there are many women who do not know that they might be living under the shadow of cancer…..Life comes with many challenges. The ones that should not scare us are the ones we can take on and take control of.
A report on KYW News Radio 1060 today made my ears perk up when I heard it. It was about cancer related complaints having doubled with the EEOC (Equal Employment Opportunity Commission) in the last decade.
Here is the text of what I heard on the radio in the car:
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has seen an increase in the number of cancer-related complaints over the past few years.
The number of cancer patients filing claims with the EEOC has more than doubled since 2003…..Part of the spike may have resulted from cancer being specifically included as a disability under Americans with Disabilities Act, but it could also be heightened awareness of rights among employees.
“If you’re being asked, ‘Do you have cancer,’ ‘how many days of work have you missed,’ they could be trying to screen you out,” says Shannon Powers, spokesperson for the Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission.
She says the Pennsylvania Human Relations Act prohibits employers from firing or not hiring someone because they have a disability.
“The Pennsylvania Human Relations Act defines disability as anything that significantly limits one’s normal life activities, and it can very well include cancer,” she says. “You do have to be able to perform the job, but your qualifications are really the only important thing.”
Those who have followed my breast cancer blog from the beginning know that I had issues with my previous employer.
We’ll start with because they were a small company they did not have to offer health benefits to employees even though the owner of the firm had corporate health benefits for himself. Employees could have been offered access to benefits and paid their own way under his plan, but that never happened while I was there. There was also no access to a retirement plan.
There was no set vacation or sick day schedule. Now that can work to your advantage if you need a couple of extra vacation days, but if you were having a major surgery it could be and was extraordinarily nerve-wracking. I pushed myself post surgery much sooner than I should have because I was afraid NOT to work. That is a fear no one should live with that has a legitimate illness or health condition that they need treated. I never asked my former employer for a hand out, but a little more consideration at the time would have been nice.
The audio version of the report also talked about the EEOC or Human Relations people saying cancer patients had rights under FMLA or the Family Leave and Medical Act. What the report neglected to inform listeners is that small companies are EXEMPT from FMLA. If your employer is under 50 employees, they don’t have to pay attention to this.
The alternative is to sue under Americans With Disabilities Act. And hell yes, I thought about it and sought legal counsel. I was a triple threat: a woman over 45 with breast cancer. But that whole suing an employer is a long drawn out legal process that is very stressful ( I know people who have sued under this act and won). So I weighed my options. I had the choice to have a protracted legal battle, see if I could find something within the company that reduced my stress, or leave.
There was nothing else available for me to do with my former employer (again – it is a small company so there weren’t tons of jobs), so as you all know, I made the difficult decision to leave in February 2012 as in order to reduce stress post breast cancer. It wasn’t so secret and was even mentioned in an article about my former company somewhere around then in the Wall Street Journal.
I am a fighter, but for me personally there was not enough to be gained if I filed litigation under the Americans With Disabilities Act as what they call in the legal industry “a triple threat”. Could I have succeeded with a claim? Quite possibly, but the trade offs weren’t worth it to me. After all, I was trying to reduce stress to be more healthy as a now cancer survivor.
Amusingly enough, a blogger who recently went of in a tizzy on me (I didn’t like her blog) had as her big “a-ha” moment was “you haven’t worked in a year”. Ok wow, no big secret I took some time off and changed the way I live…I had breast cancer.
Sheesh, it alters you. And people have absolutely NO idea how it drains you to keep up a close to normal schedule post-cancer surgery while also undergoing treatment.
But the jaded skeptic in me thinks the laws are indeed still designed to be discriminatory against cancer patients, especially women. After all, a lot of cancer patients are dealing with too much to fight everything at once.
Anyway, I am glad this news report is out there. I wish they would go further and talk about all the people who had issues but did not report it to anyone and why they chose not to report. I think that would be interesting.
In exactly one week it will be two years since I began this blog about breast cancer – as in my life experience dancing a dance with this disease that afflicts millions each year.
On Sunday, I mark two years since my initial diagnosis.
June 1st is my second cancerversary – a/k/a out out damn lump day.
In 3 years and a couple of months I will be finished with Tamoxifen.
What a long strange (yet wonderful) trip it has been. Well not wonderful all of the time. Let’s be honest. Having and recovering from breast cancer requires a LOT of emotional energy along with everything else.
I will admit that recently I have had a bit of a struggle. I haven’t wanted to whine about it up here lest some of you think I was a big baby or ungrateful or whatever.
The Tamoxifen has been hard on me again. Where I was sleeping better, it started another round of sleepus interruptus with me. Also some wicked hot flashes and night sweats……which are most unpleasant. And when you don’t sleep, the emotional component is everylittle thing becomes a general pain in the ass.
Yes, I actually did the stare down with my Tamoxifen bottle recently. I would never play Russian Roulette with my life and just stop taking it, but it has given me pause lately.
Yet when Tamoxifen gives me pause, I remember that I can hack it and look how far I have come.
Lately too I have discovered some new critics of my writing. One person in particular because I said I did not like their blog. This blogger totally went overboard. The irony is I have never met this woman, wouldn’t know her if I tripped over her.
But hey, when you write in the public eye, you take the good with the bad, even I know that. One of the things this woman seemed to obsess over is that as per her calculation (because she knows me, right?) I had not worked in a year. Yeah o.k., right I missed the memo where anyone had the right to judge me for resigning an incredibly stressful job post breast cancer. LOL, it’s not like I hid the truthfully hard decision to do this from anyone. I wrote about it! What was the most odd is how she threw it at me in some “a-ha!” moment like I was ashamed of it or something. I now know who she is, and suffice it to say, she is lucky I am not as mean or as angry as she is. But that is one of the gifts of breast cancer, and I am not being sarcastic, either – you actually can let things go a little more easily once you have had to face your own mortality.
The past year I have marched to the beat of my drummer and no one else’s. I have worked my whole life, and continue to do so. I am just more low-key, adding in a lot of what I want to do into the equation. Because of my sweet man I am able to do this. And we continue to build our lives together – and I love that man more every day. If anyone had told me in high school some day I would fall in love with a boy I was just friends with in high school I would not have believed them. But oh my, how lucky I am to have him!
Hitting pause and slowing it down has been the best thing I could do for myself. When I hit that wall of exhaustion I had to stop and reevaluate. So here I am.
Am I the same person or a different person from when I began this journey? A little bit of both. I am me just different. This experience has indeed altered my reality.
I chose a very public way of dealing with this by writing a blog. I have even become part of a book of survivor stories. ( See The Pink Moon Lovelies: Empowering Stories of Survival on Amazon.com) I also chose to be positive, and that has been a chore some weeks – it is not as easy as it sounds, but at the end of the day I am very, very lucky thus far and have no business being anything BUT positive.
Other things – I have tried to reduce chemicals and stuff in my life so I decided to stop coloring my hair – the chemicals going on my head skeeved me out a little when I thought about it. I hadn’t been coloring for that long anyway, so it wasn’t so hard. My hair is slightly threaded with gray, but not that much. I will say I have noticed some women who haven’t seen me in a while looking at my hair like I am crazy, which is rather amusing.
I hold my breath every time I have to take a test, but I know I am not alone with this. I have met other breast cancer gals who like me had issue with the whole “survivor” word. One woman I know quipped recently that she doesn’t consider herself a survivor that she just did what the doctors recommended.
Again, can I say I know I am one of the lucky ones. I know I am. I know other women who have had a much harder time getting on and getting through, and I know some incredibly fabulous women who have had recurrences. I am blessed.
I am blessed in other ways too. Today I received a note from a woman who reduced me to a puddle of tears. I was just that touched by what she had to say. I am going to share:
I have spent the last week reading your entire blog from the first post to the last post. I felt somewhat sad last night as I finished the last post–like ending a good book, but missing the experience. We are so much alike it is scary–from liking old houses, to calling people on their rude crappy behavior, living in the Philadelphia area, writers, profound thinkers, love of the countryside, a tween stepchild (I just got married Oct 2011), having been dumped by an ex a few years ago, almost the same age, having a wonderful man–‘sweet man” as you say : ) , and breast cancer. I guess the one notable difference is that you are a survivor, and I am just beginning the process–I rec’d the diagnosis on March 22.
I was really ready to just lay down and die (seriously), however, when I found your blog, I was able to see more clearly. A lot of other sources I read were frightening in the way that I felt a horrific dread from them and a lifetime of pink bizarre stuff. I feel better about the Tamoxifen after reading your experience.
The past month has been a bizarre arena of Dr.’s appointments, and a blur of “who am I? What is my name? When will I wake up from this dream?” Surgery is scheduled for May 14th. Chemo, Radiation, and Tamoxifen to follow. I feel like someone has gone: “Duck, Duck, GOOSE” and I was the goose who got the cancer. No family history save for 1-cousin who is younger than I (she is stage 4, aggressive tumor…in remission and doing ok). I am somewhere between. a stage 1 and 2–no one will know for sure until the surgery. It’s a low risk tumor. While I want the surgery immediately (like yesterday), I am still frightened to death over it….. I’m sure you understand this feeling
I also had to laugh over your post about the oncotyping….hehe…I read your post about it last Thursday, and then Friday, I rec’d a similar call. 24-hours earlier I had no idea what the hell an “oncotype” is—sounds like a pair of shoes for seniors.
Facing one’s mortality is the creepiest thing I have ever experienced. Anyway, I was hoping we could share more over the next few months. You have helped me tremendously–so much so that I could barely function until I started to read your words. I hope I can follow in your path. Amazing the support from strangers… and how “friends” can just sort disappear…. Going thru cancer is much the same as when you are going through a divorce/break-up. There are some people that think it’s viral and that they will catch it just by being around you. Then there are the others that think you are going to die tomorrow. I know people react differently to this type of information–I do get that, but some people just act like clods.
Anyway, sorry for the length. I would have emailed privately, but I could not find an email address, so I hope me sending you this note/post this way is ok.
Melinda is her name, and she has her surgery on May 14th….my 49th birthday. This woman, who doesn’t know me at all, made me realize I did do the right thing by starting this blog. Here e-mail is like this crazy life affirmation to me that more women than not are connected by something.
Melinda – baby steps and you will get through. Don’t be afraid to laugh and cry and raise a little hell. If people can’t handle what you have to say, that is on them, don’t bring it on yourself. Melinda, I can’t thank you enough for writing to me. People like you make baring all this drivel out loud worth while.
I will be thinking of you on May 14th and am asking my other BC gals to throw up a prayer or two and positive thoughts into the universe.
A long while ago my friend (and amazing writer) Nicki Boscia Durlester told me she was writing another book. Only this one would be different. It would not just be her journey through breast cancer, it would be the stories of many.
Nicki asked me to be part of this, and I said yes. And as the calendar creeps up on the 2nd anniversary of my diagnosis and the 2nd anniversary of my surgery, the book is out and published.
It arrives at ironically another important time for me: next week marks my next rounds of mammograms and breast and other ultrasounds. And as crazy as it sounds, yesterday I was a little anxious at the thought of this. I know these feelings are human and natural, and sometimes it annoys the crap out of me that before my diagnosis I just sailed in and out of these tests. Now I hold my breath before and after as I wait for the “all clear”.
So along comes this book, just at the perfect time.
I am incredibly proud and rather emotional at being a part of this book. There are a lot of survivor stories out there, and it is an honor to have been chosen to stand with all these amazing and incredible women.
Like every breast cancer diagnosed, no one woman’s story is exactly the same although you will find threads of commonality that bond us together.
If you are a survivor or new on this journey, books like this let you know you are not only not alone but should never be without hope.
I am floored by the power of words today as this book which was literally just released is currently #9 on the bestsellers list on Amazon for all cancer books, #31 in diseases and disorders and #1,074 out of all books. There are 1,748,230 book titles on Amazon.
So my birthday today has been full of many signs. I see them as all positive. They seem to show me quite a few stages of life and the reality therein. Some could take them as negative given the fact a woman I know had breast cancer surgery earlier this morning and I saw a funeral cortege pass by me, but why? I see it as positive that Melinda is dealing with her cancer and that she is having surgery at a low stage. As for the funeral cortege, in the midst of sadness is the ultimate celebration of life. Yes we mourn when someone passes, but we also celebrate who they were and how they touched our lives, don’t we?
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