Ch. 2 The Smile in the Pit of the Arm
I have more surgery and find that the cancer has spread to my lymph nodes, which makes me a kindred
spirit of Hsing-Hsing, the giant panda in the Washington, D.C. Zoo, also undergoing lymph node removal
Ch. 3 Slashed, Poisoned and Burned, Oh My!
Three of the standard protocols for treating breast cancer are surgery (slash) chemotherapy (poison) and
radiation (burn), and my doctors recommend the full triathlon for me. By the time the year-long process is
outlined, I am simultaneously relieved to know there is a plan, and worried about my ability to stay the
course.
Ch. 4 The Main Central Vertical Flow
I begin to explore alternative therapies, including jin shin jyutsu, a physio-philosophy handed down from
Japanese tradition, which balances out energy in the body and releases blockages.
Ch. 5 I Guess We're All Going Back to Church
For years I have organized memorial services at work for colleagues who have died, and now that I find
myself in need of prayer, I decide I'd rather have them immediately, while I'm in a better position to benefit
from them. Friends and family gather together in a healing service on May 7, 1997, National Anxiety
Disorder Screening Day.
Ch. 6 Bring on the Toxins, Bring on the Drugs
I begin chemotherapy the same day as my 20th college reunion. Friends call me from the campus
festivities, and upon hearing that I experienced no side-effects, they ask if I could share my anti-nausea
drugs with them, as they were feeling significant side-effects from their celebration.
Ch. 7 Velcro Hair and Vacuumed Head
Losing my hair turns out to be a far more humorous experience than I ever imagined. Shopping for wigs,
washing the last strands of hair down the drain and remembering to put something on my head before I
leave for work each morning become familiar routines.
Ch. 8 Humorous Healing and Kick-Ass Cures
I research other people's survival strategies, and update them for the 90's. Where Norman Cousins
watched the Marx Brothers and Three Stooges to keep up his spirits and strengthen his immune system, I
watch Monty Python and Politically Incorrect for my daily dose of humor. Sometimes comic relief doesn't
work and I need cinematic representations of good triumphing over evil. At those times I turn to action
movies - films starring Bruce Willis or Jean Claude van Damme usually fit the bill - and see the bad guys
get their butts kicked.
Ch. 9 Thank You Marie Curie
As I go for my daily radiation therapy, I remember the junior high school book report I did on the life of Marie
Curie, whose picture hangs on the wall of the radiation unit. As an unenlightened eighth-grader in the
1960's I could not understand why girls would want to study something as boring as science. As a cancer
patient in the 1990's I am so grateful that she didn’t share my myopic view of the scientific world and
preserved in her discovery of radium, even though that ultimately killed her.
Ch. 10 Farewell to Da
My father is diagnosed with cancer shortly after me and we decide we now qualify for our own family cancer
cluster. His treatment is not as successful as mine, and he dies in three months. I think of him as having
taken my place and given me another shot at living.
Ch.11 Do Bras Cause Cancer, and if so Will Pizza Cure it, or if not, Would More Sex Have Prevented it in the
First Place?
Some of the less scientific theories on causes and cures.
Ch.12 Postoperative Parking Perils
The Boston area has some of the best hospitals in the world. The same cannot be said of its parking
garages or its drivers. After a few trips back and forth to treatment facilities I decide that while I probably will
survive the cancer, I am less certain of my ability to survive the commute back and forth to treatment or find
a parking spot in the many hospital garages with which I am rapidly becoming very familiar.
Ch. 13 Return of the Tattooed Lady
I finish treatment, and assume that because I am no longer having toxic chemicals pumped into me on a
regular basis, I will feel fine. However, it’s not so easy to move beyond cancer, and I realize that I need to
define for myself how I want to live in this uncertain time. I work through the demons and emerge stronger,
more creative and empowered by the experience.
Toxic, Tattooed, the text
I'm working on this book and hope it will be published soon to help spread the word
I'm working on this book and hope it will be published soon to help spread the word
Ch. 1 A Cyst is Just a Cyst
I am diagnosed with breast cancer on the first day of spring, 1997. I keep the news quiet until
the doctors know how serious it is, and my life becomes a strange mix of endless medical
appointments interspersed throughout my normal daily routines.
I am diagnosed with breast cancer on the first day of spring, 1997. I keep the news quiet until
the doctors know how serious it is, and my life becomes a strange mix of endless medical
appointments interspersed throughout my normal daily routines.
Chapter 1 - A Cyst is Just a Cyst
I planned my funeral the Christmas I was 27.
Earlier that month I found a lump in my breast, and in the two weeks it took to have a mammogram, wait for the results
to come back and then get an appointment with the doctor, I assumed the worst. Convinced I had cancer, and
anticipating my certain death, I planned for my eventual demise. I envisioned my whole family participating in the funeral
Mass, to be held at St. Anne’s Parish in our hometown of Hull, Massachusetts, and concelebrated by several of our
family’s priestly friends. Mom and Dad would do the readings, my sisters Paula and Brigid would play the piano and
flute during the service, and my brother Justin would play taps on his trumpet at the cemetery. I was still pondering the
choice of a eulogist - one of my other five siblings? my longtime friends John or Steve? - when I finally got in to see the
doctor. He stuck a needle in the lump in my left breast, pronounced it a cyst, drained out the fluid and sent me on my
way. I called off the embalmers and canceled the clerics.
Fifteen Decembers later I found another lump. My annual physical and mammogram were scheduled in January, and I
saw no point in having the Christmas 1996 lump looked at any sooner.
"It's nothing to worry about,” my doctor told me when I saw her the following month. “I can feel that it’s a cyst. It’s not
connected to anything and it moves around when I palpate it.” The mammogram didn’t indicate anything remotely
suspicious, and the ultrasound showed only a small, liquid-filled bubble. She sent me to the surgeon who aspirated the
cyst. It disappeared and so did I, to California for a conference and a vacation. I returned two weeks later. So did the cyst.
“It looks like the same one I had last month,” I told the ultrasound technician as we both stared at the image on the
screen. “It’s the same size and it’s even in the same place.”
She probably had done dozens of ultrasounds in the weeks since she did my last one, but she seemed to remember
mine, and I felt a peculiar sense of pride, as though my insignificant little mass were somehow memorable. She agreed
it looked the same and so did Dr. Friedman, but he suggested having it removed so it wouldn’t worry me. He explained
where he’d make the incision, so that there wouldn’t be much of a scar. Not that anyone other than medical personnel
had been exploring that area of late, but I did want to keep my assets in good form. We scheduled the surgery for March
17, St. Patrick’s Day, an auspicious date for someone who, while not actually born in the land of saints and scholars,
was conceived there. I took this date as a good omen.
My mother came up the night before so she could accompany me to the hospital. We arrived in Pre-Op by 7:00 a.m. and
they wheeled me into the operating room by 8:00. I was given a local anesthesia which was supposed to keep me just
below the surface of consciousness. I told them I preferred to be well below the surface of consciousness since I didn’t
want to wake up during surgery as a colleague of mine had a few weeks earlier. In the middle of his operation he
regained consciousness and launched into a lecture on the Portuguese mercantile system of the 1840's, which kept the
entire surgical team spellbound for a few moments until the anesthesiologist gave him another dose and he fell back
asleep. I regained consciousness at one point, and while totally disoriented and unable to lecture as he had done, I
could hear the surgical team discussing skiing. I tried to tell them to stop talking and to pay attention to their work, but all
I could manage were a few mumbles after which I dozed off again.
I woke up at 9 a.m. in the recovery room feeling a little groggy but otherwise fine. My mother was sitting by my side.
Pretty soon she got up to socialize and went across the room to speak with a woman she seemed to know, who then
came over to my bedside. She patted my hand and told me how pleased she was to hear that everything had gone well.
When Mom came back I asked who she was.
“That’s Anne, says Mom. “Her sister Emily just had surgery this morning and we had a nice chat out in the waiting
room.”
Oh great, I thought. It was bad enough that most of my relatives were worried about my unremarkable little surgery. Now
complete strangers were getting my medical history.
I planned my funeral the Christmas I was 27.
Earlier that month I found a lump in my breast, and in the two weeks it took to have a mammogram, wait for the results
to come back and then get an appointment with the doctor, I assumed the worst. Convinced I had cancer, and
anticipating my certain death, I planned for my eventual demise. I envisioned my whole family participating in the funeral
Mass, to be held at St. Anne’s Parish in our hometown of Hull, Massachusetts, and concelebrated by several of our
family’s priestly friends. Mom and Dad would do the readings, my sisters Paula and Brigid would play the piano and
flute during the service, and my brother Justin would play taps on his trumpet at the cemetery. I was still pondering the
choice of a eulogist - one of my other five siblings? my longtime friends John or Steve? - when I finally got in to see the
doctor. He stuck a needle in the lump in my left breast, pronounced it a cyst, drained out the fluid and sent me on my
way. I called off the embalmers and canceled the clerics.
Fifteen Decembers later I found another lump. My annual physical and mammogram were scheduled in January, and I
saw no point in having the Christmas 1996 lump looked at any sooner.
"It's nothing to worry about,” my doctor told me when I saw her the following month. “I can feel that it’s a cyst. It’s not
connected to anything and it moves around when I palpate it.” The mammogram didn’t indicate anything remotely
suspicious, and the ultrasound showed only a small, liquid-filled bubble. She sent me to the surgeon who aspirated the
cyst. It disappeared and so did I, to California for a conference and a vacation. I returned two weeks later. So did the cyst.
“It looks like the same one I had last month,” I told the ultrasound technician as we both stared at the image on the
screen. “It’s the same size and it’s even in the same place.”
She probably had done dozens of ultrasounds in the weeks since she did my last one, but she seemed to remember
mine, and I felt a peculiar sense of pride, as though my insignificant little mass were somehow memorable. She agreed
it looked the same and so did Dr. Friedman, but he suggested having it removed so it wouldn’t worry me. He explained
where he’d make the incision, so that there wouldn’t be much of a scar. Not that anyone other than medical personnel
had been exploring that area of late, but I did want to keep my assets in good form. We scheduled the surgery for March
17, St. Patrick’s Day, an auspicious date for someone who, while not actually born in the land of saints and scholars,
was conceived there. I took this date as a good omen.
My mother came up the night before so she could accompany me to the hospital. We arrived in Pre-Op by 7:00 a.m. and
they wheeled me into the operating room by 8:00. I was given a local anesthesia which was supposed to keep me just
below the surface of consciousness. I told them I preferred to be well below the surface of consciousness since I didn’t
want to wake up during surgery as a colleague of mine had a few weeks earlier. In the middle of his operation he
regained consciousness and launched into a lecture on the Portuguese mercantile system of the 1840's, which kept the
entire surgical team spellbound for a few moments until the anesthesiologist gave him another dose and he fell back
asleep. I regained consciousness at one point, and while totally disoriented and unable to lecture as he had done, I
could hear the surgical team discussing skiing. I tried to tell them to stop talking and to pay attention to their work, but all
I could manage were a few mumbles after which I dozed off again.
I woke up at 9 a.m. in the recovery room feeling a little groggy but otherwise fine. My mother was sitting by my side.
Pretty soon she got up to socialize and went across the room to speak with a woman she seemed to know, who then
came over to my bedside. She patted my hand and told me how pleased she was to hear that everything had gone well.
When Mom came back I asked who she was.
“That’s Anne, says Mom. “Her sister Emily just had surgery this morning and we had a nice chat out in the waiting
room.”
Oh great, I thought. It was bad enough that most of my relatives were worried about my unremarkable little surgery. Now
complete strangers were getting my medical history.
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