About 30% of people diagnosed with breast cancer at any stage will develop distal metastasis. I am one.
Okay, I got used to the surgical scars across my chest and under my arm. I got used to the radiation burn down the middle of my chest. I got used to the weakness in my left arm after surgery. I got used to my lopsided silhouette and to none of...
Cancer isn’t cute. It isn’t big smiles and noses crinkled in mirth. It is a mortal illness. It disfigures. It kills. The treatment involves cutting off pieces of your body, killing living tissue with radiation, poisoning your system with chemotherapy. The treatment can have life-long effects on your health...
Cancer isn’t cute. It isn’t big smiles and noses crinkled in mirth. It is a mortal illness. It disfigures. It kills. The treatment involves cutting off pieces of your body, killing living tissue with radiation, poisoning your system with chemotherapy. The treatment can have life-long effects on your health and well-being ...
It was only about four or five months ago that I wrote Pain, a post about my decision to put off taking opiate pain relievers. I was – and still am – very ambivalent about it. The difference being that now I’ve taken the plunge. This is a lot more...
This letter was written by Karen Cook, author of What Girls Learn, ten years after the death of her mother from breast cancer. It is reblogged with permission from Shaun Usher’s wonderful blog, Letters of Note: correspondence deserving of a wider audience. This letter both moved me and empowered me. I’ve been...
I’ve written a few posts about acceptance. I sure hope I wasn’t too smug because warmed-up words are not a very tasty meal. It hit me suddenly today – I’ll be fifty-eight in two days. Will I live to see my next birthday? There is a good chance that I...
Don’t Give Up . . . Don’t Ever Give Up. (Motto of the V Foundation for Cancer Research) Until a much-loved friend directed me to this video, I didn’t know much about Jimmy V (Jim Valvano). He was an award-winning American college basketball coach and sports commentator. In June 1992, at...
“Do you have a bucket list,” my friend asked me the other day. I gave it some thought. “No, I don’t. I’ve pretty much done everything I wanted to. It’s been a good life.” At the time I glibly ascribed it to what I call “living intentionally” or “an examined...
I read Goodbye Without Leaving, a novel by the late Laurie Colwin, almost twenty years ago. The book is funny and moving and very representative of its time, but what has stayed with me all these years is its epigraph: Americans leave without saying goodbye, Refugees say goodbye without leaving....
