October is a bittersweet month for me. Along with lots of ghostly ghoulish fantabulousness, there is also the ever present reminder of Breast Cancer. Big B, big C.
I’m all for awareness, I’m all for knowledge and raising money for research and cures and so on. Those are all great things. But that doesn’t mean that it’s not an occasionally painful reminder of what has been lost. Cancer (of all kinds) has affected so many people in so many powerful ways.
So as you display your pink ribbon, or participate in your walks this month, please remember all the wonderful men and women who have already been lost to us. Let’s do what we can to prevent more from having to deal with cancer, of all kinds.
The following is a post my mom wrote last year, about losing her best friend to breast cancer.
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This is a difficult assignment, not because it brings up bad memories, but because there are so many different directions I could take this.
My best friend Mary Jane was diagnosed with breast cancer in February of 2001. I was with her when the dr gave her the results of the biopsy. We went out to the van, where she asked me to drive and we drove in silence to Fleet Farm. There in the parking lot she said her first words, her first concern.
Not, why me? Not, what am I going to do?
Her first words? What will happen to Steve, Devon and the boys?
And that seemed totally in character to me. Mary Jane always put her family first. Everything she did, she did for them. Well, maybe not the dancing to the music playing in the grocery store aisles…but I digress.
She decided to fight this cancer because her family needed her. So she had the chemo. She had the surgery. I remember people asking her if she was upset about having a mastectomy. Her answer?
Why would I be…it’s just a boob. To her, giving up her breast in order to live to take care of her kids was a no brainer.
She went through chemo, surgery and radiation. She lost her hair. She was disappointed that she did not lose the hair on her legs also and had to keep shaving.
She had also been looking forward to losing weight while on chemo…it was not to be. She would joke with the nurse about being the only cancer patient who gained weight during therapy.
We would laugh as she got loopy off the benadryl they gave her to counteract the nausea the chemo could produce.
On the day of her last chemo treatment, she wore a plastic tiara on her bald head for her doctor exam. He loved it. That was Mary Jane…quirky sense of humor, make others feel at ease. Look for the positive.
I will never forget the day I caught her and the mother of another friend of mine in the kitchen at church, comparing fake boobs. What a hoot! They both just whipped them out and compared weight and shape…so typical.
Her daughter Devon got married and had a little boy. Her boys grew and she started home schooling the oldest.
She worked with kids in 4-H, helped her husband, tried to cook healthy, even ground her own wheat.
She loved her boys, who were 4 and 8. She lived.
Devon got pregnant again and was due in April. In February the doctor said Mary Jane’s liver was enlarged and sent her for a CT scan. The scan showed the cancer was back.
She went for a liver biopsy on a Friday. By Sunday she was getting yellow and on Monday she couldn’t get up without passing out. At the hospital they found she was bleeding from the biopsy. She fought.
She managed to listen to the birth of her granddaughter over the phone and then hold her when she was just hours old. She really tried to beat it. But about six weeks later , in April of 2003, I said goodbye to the closest friend I’ve ever had and watched her go be with the Lord.
So how does this tie in with Breast Cancer Awareness? Well, she bugged all of us to get mammograms. Her’s was a fast growing cancer and probably wouldn’t have been found early enough, but most can.
And she reminded us that we never know when our time will come, so be ready on two levels. Love your kids and husband today, because tomorrow may never come. And be ready to meet the Lord. You may not have to chance to “get right” with Him later. There may be no later. John 3:16 was a favorite verse.
Most of all…just live. Enjoy your life now. Find something good about it and change what isn’t good if you can. Love other people. Love God.
And don’t be afraid to play with plungers in the grocery store aisles while you dance to My Sharona.
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