A woman in my neighborhood, I’ll refer to as Ms. A, was diagnosed with breast cancer over the summer.  The mother of young children,  Ms. A has always been active, busy, plugged in, socially conscious, etc… then suddenly, in a flash, her life just changed. Out of nowhere, like so many other women, wives, mothers, daughters, aunts, friends and neighbors, her life simply changed.

When word spread through our community, there were countless vibrations of disbelief.  It was as though we could imagine it happening to anyone, except for the person it happened to.  It felt like a huge irony somehow, like Christopher Reeve, superman, ending up in a wheelchair. 

Ms.A is, and was, vivacious, funny, outrageous,  and fiercely proud of her augmented breasts, or ‘boobies’ as she calls them.  Her undergoing double mastectomy, after the augmentation, felt like a real crash and burn.  Then came the dreaded, countless rounds of chemo, the hair falling out, the general ‘poopiness’ of it all, as she calls it.

Ms. A has been open hearted and generous enough about her experience to share her journey in an online care sight, where she can faithfully, for the benefit of loved ones, enter updates about her progress and setbacks,  and allow the folks in her world to sign in and root her on. 

What I’m sure she never expected was how her words could have ended up helping the rest of us, and I’d like to hope that her ‘guests’ in her online guestbook have helped her ‘keep the faith’ during her long days and restless nights.  She has told her story with mighty grit, humor, passion, and determination.  None of us who have followed her updates have been able to escape without laughter and countless tears. 

Ms. A has written hilarious accounts on wig shopping, false eyelash application, complete with rhinestone hearts (‘for bling’ - her words, not mine.)  She went so far as to hold a head shaving party,  which her husband and young son participated in, shaving their heads also, for support, with love.

I’ve never had the priviledge of learning about the process of breast cancer treatment first hand, or kicking cancer’s @#$, as she says. Ms. A, much to my own disbelief, has almost turned it into something fun, a kind of adventure, like an extended kind of field trip, though filled with many peaks and valleys.

She had a friend make her a shiny pink cape, complete with ‘sparkly’ trim so she could wear it to her treatments, dubbing it her ‘chemo cape’—genius!  We have all believed that if anyone can beat this, surely Ms, A can.  This belief has been a beacon for her community at large.  She is connecting with women all over, in various stages of diagnosis and treatment.  She has given the rest of us something to grab onto, and in extending herself, she’s given the rest of us a chance to connect.  What a gift. That kind of stuff is heavy.  It’s connection, and it’s why were here, or at least that’s what I like to believe.  Yeah, she’s toughing out the treatments, but she is also generously sharing her story, the good, the bad and the ugly, and for that, she may never really know who she’s touched.  And that’s something to be thankful for this holiday season.  Happy Thanksgiving to all, and to Ms. A and her family especially.

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