Category: breast cancer

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Conversations Outside the Preschool Door: Has Breast Cancer Touched Your Life?

At the beginning of December, I returned home from burying my mother. I had a broken heart, and reentering “normal” life seemed difficult. One of Lily’s best friends had a birthday party, and it would be the first time I would be socializing with the parents of her preschool friends after Mom’s death. Lily had missed a week of school, and I had to postpone her birthday party, so they all knew about Mom’s death.

I am not close friends with any of the parents of Lily’s preschool friends, but they showed me such warmth and compassion that they made such a difference in the week of our return.

As I was talking with one of the moms, she shared with me her story. Her grandmother had died from breast cancer, and her mom was diagnosed with ovarian cancer and died soon after. With this history of cancer, this mom’s doctor wanted her to see a genetic counselor. With this history of cancer, this mom is terrified of what the genetic counselor will discover, so she has yet to make the appointment.

As we talked, we discovered that our doctors recommended the same genetic counselor. I keep meaning to make that appointment for myself, and I told her I let her know what the whole process was like.

This whole conversation wasn’t a quiet tete-a-tete over a cup of coffee. We were in the middle of Chuck E. Cheese’s, surrounded by flashing lights, running and squealing kids, and a big, wandering mascot mouse!

There are so many people I know whose lives have been touched somehow by breast cancer, and so I’m bringing the question to you:

How has your life been touched by breast cancer?

Leave a comment here, or go to the Lemon Drop Pie Community and join the conversation!

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Mom Was a Fighter

Mom was a fighter. She was first diagnosed with breast cancer 26 years ago, when she was 40 years old. She fought like crazy to get better and have the best life she could have. She was devastated when I was diagnosed with the same disease. She could handle being a breast cancer survivor, but to have me following in her footsteps at the young age of 27 was almost more than she could bear. We got through that horrible year of surgery and chemotherapy together.

Lily was not happy when this picture was taken!

Mom and I walked the Y-Me Walk downtown Chicago a few years ago. She had found out not long before that her cancer had metastasized to her bones.

Before she died, Mom told me that she didn’t want to give up. Her cancer had mutated into a monster that just couldn’t be controlled. One of the doctors told my dad that her cancer had been a puppy that turned into a pit bull. We were all hoping that there would be another treatment, something else that she could do. Mom would have had chemotherapy in a minute. But there was nothing left. The cancer was too aggressive.

Mom, you never gave up.