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Thinking about pink

Cindy on October 7th, 2009

My cancer scare changed my life.  I’m grateful for every new, healthy day I have. ~Olivia Newton-John

October is National Breast Cancer Awareness Month, and the media won’t let us forget it. This month, you can’t look at a magazine or a newspaper without being reminded that the disease will strike some of the women you know. Mothers, sisters, aunts, friends.

I take these reminders seriously. Every October, I make a donation to someone who is running or walking in a marathon for “the cure.” And I volunteer my services as a writing and journaling coach to a local breast cancer support group.

Then I schedule an appointment with my gynecologist, who will write my annual prescription for a mammogram. While I don’t look forward to this procedure (and I’m always relieved when it’s over), I keep urging my friend Cathy to do the same.

Cathy is 48 and has good health insurance — but she’s never had a mammogram. Why is that?  As Cathy puts it, “I’m afraid they might find something.”

It’s hard to argue with anyone who lets fear or anxiety dictate her health-care decisions. But I don’t give up. Regular screening, I tell Cathy, brings a woman peace of mind — or might even save her life.  And, oh yes, I speak from experience when I tell her that sometimes they do “find something.”

I’ve never been diagnosed with breast cancer, but I’ve had two worrisome biopsies over the past 18 years. All said and done, I learned that even the most painful biopsy has a silver lining and life-changing lessons to teach.

For starters, I’m forever grateful for modern medical technology. My paternal grandmother, who was diagnosed with the disease in the 1950s and lost a breast, didn’t have the advantages of today’s early screening procedures and diagnostic tools. But I do. If she were alive today, my grandmother would applaud me for taking advantage of them.

I still remember the icy grip of anxiety squeezing my chest when the gynecologist found my first breast lump. My hands trembled as I drew the paper sheet around my shoulders and watched the doctor scribble the number of “an excellent breast surgeon” on his prescription pad. I’d been fairly diligent about performing my own breast exams, but apparently I had missed the lump that worried my doctor.

The lump was removed at the hospital less than a week later. My incision was closed with several stitches, and my husband drove me home as soon as the anesthesia wore off. Then I spent a couple of hellish days waiting in what I called “biopsy limbo.”

I jumped each time the phone rang.

My breast surgeon told me later that it’s not uncommon for patients to reorder their priorities while awaiting biopsy results. Our previous concerns and problems seem less significant, and ordinary life suddenly shimmers like newly fallen snow.

Through it all, I was surprised at the ease with which my friends and I talked about the spiritual earthquake that rumbles when our annual medical check-ups reveal that we aren’t immortal after all.  Life pulsates with immediacy; every moment is underscored with deeper meaning. We appreciate our loved ones more than ever — and vow to stop taking them all for granted.

Of course, after we get the good news and the incision heals, we tend to forget. Weeks pass and we lose our liberating perspective. Life gets crazy again, and before long we’re back to playing small. We revisit old arguments; gripe about our jobs; rant about political enemies; wish for things we don’t have.

But this week I’m reminding myself to retain the life lessons I learned from my breast biopsies. And I will keep reminding Cathy that breast-cancer screening should be taken seriously, every month of the year.  She can’t put it off for another October.

– Cindy La Ferle

Tags: attitude adjustment after a biopsy, breast biopsy, breast cancer, Breast Cancer Awareness Month, gynecology and breast exams, mammogram
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