JENNIFER

October 2, 2015, is the day my life changed in ways I could never imagine. My name is Jennifer Ollero, and I am a breast cancer thriver.  And I am grateful. 

On October 2, 2015, I got my annual mammogram. Everything seemed routine, so I wasn’t scared when they asked me to stay for an ultrasound, a standard for us dense-breast-tissue girlies. I left the appointment without giving it a second thought and happily went about my day.

A few days later I received an email that the test results were in my K-Chart. That K-Chart — a blessing and a curse. Not one to wait, I immediately opened the email expecting to read that the results were normal, but that wasn’t the case. They found a suspicious cluster in my left breast. I distinctly remember the rush of panic and nausea that pulsed through my body, followed by several panicked calls to my doctor’s office, begging to be seen right away. It took a few tries and some tears, but my doctor agreed to see me that day. The next call was to my best friend and husband, Ryan, the voice of calm and reason who I would need by my side.

For people who don’t know me, I am extremely intense, stubborn, and determined — a true Scorpio. But that first doctor’s appointment shut me down. I sat quietly as the doctor explained the next steps. I’m not sure I even heard half of what he said; I just recall my husband asking questions and pushing to get the ball rolling on what would become a barrage of biopsies, MRIs, and doctor appointments.

There was a lot of uncertainty about the surgery and treatment plan, which depended on the tumor’s pathology. This left me with plenty of time to do my own research on breast cancers and treatments, courtesy of WebMD. Not a rabbit hole I recommend going down. I spiraled for several days, causing waves of anxiety that nearly paralyzed me. But by Nov. 5, I had my answer and knew my surgical and treatment plan. I had estrogen and progesterone receptor-positive cancer and would be having a unilateral mastectomy. This meant one, I wouldn’t need the “red devil” chemotherapy and two, I wouldn’t need radiation. I felt an immediate sense of relief. It was at this point I recognized how lucky I was.

I had seven days to get ready for the first surgery. I went into autopilot, checking off my to-do list. First was telling our family. I didn’t want to upset my children or parents until I had a diagnosis and a surgical plan. I didn’t want them going down the WebMD rabbit hole. I wanted to answer their questions with certainty. And it was now time. These were the toughest conversations I have ever had.

Next came work. At the time, I worked for MSA, a Hanford contractor. They were supportive, ensuring I didn’t need to worry about anything other than my health. Financially, I was taken care of, which lifted a huge weight off my shoulders. I also spent time at the Tri-Cities Cancer Center, where the resource center connected me with post-mastectomy items I would need. They were a godsend. Who would ever think you’d need a special camisole post-surgery? I didn’t. They also walked me through the items in my Kadlec mastectomy bag, filled with tried-and-true tools for recovery: a small pillow to protect your chest, a satin ribbon to tie drain tubes to while showering, and “no-water” shampoo. Things I never would have thought of.

On Nov. 12, two days after my 44th birthday, I headed to Kadlec for the first of three surgeries. It was mastectomy day, and I was relieved to finally evict the cancer from my body. Two weeks later, the day before Thanksgiving, I was back for round two, the reconstruction phase. These were not easy procedures. It was emotionally tough to lose a part of what made me feel “womanly,” and physically tough as well. I didn’t expect to feel like someone had beat me up, but I did. I couldn’t wash my own hair. I couldn’t raise my arms. I shuffled around like a 90-year-old man. But I knew I was lucky — lucky that the right radiologist reviewed my mammogram and spotted the tiniest speck, knowing it was abnormal.

Cancer changes you in ways you can’t imagine. For me, it was adjusting to the physical and emotional changes. I had been medically thrust into menopause (the worst) and was adjusting to a silicone blob implanted in my chest. I found myself needing to connect with others who were facing similar challenges: somewhat maimed and trying to navigate life with the cancer stigma. It’s a strange feeling to have people you’ve known for years suddenly treat you differently because of the big C.

So, I looked for support groups and found Warrior Sisterhood through Facebook. Warrior Sisterhood is a program within the Tri-Cities Cancer Center, founded in 2013 by local cancer warriors to ensure women are supported at all stages of their cancer journey. This was the lifeline I was looking for. In the summer of 2016, they were having their annual picnic, so I reached out to attend. I didn’t know anyone, and I was nervous. I even made my teenage daughter come with me. But they greeted me with open arms, welcoming me like a long-lost friend. It felt like I had known them all my life. I had found my people and my new purpose. Within a few months, I joined their board of directors and became immersed in helping others navigate their new normal.

Like so many before me, I became an advocate for cancer education, prevention, treatment, recovery, and survivorship. It’s a mouthful, but so is cancer. It’s scary enough just being told you have cancer; it’s worse when you feel like you must face it alone. Unfortunately, far too many people in our community do face it alone. Since my recovery, it has been my mission to share my experience with others to alleviate some of the fear. I am no expert, and everyone’s cancer journey is unique, but there is something reassuring about connecting with someone who has been through it. Being able to answer questions and guide people to resources they may not have known about is rewarding in its own small way.

Today I serve on the Tri-Cities Cancer Center Foundation Board, where I advocate for patient resources, state-of-the-art medical technology, and ensuring patients can receive the necessary care here at home, which is increasingly important given financial uncertainty in the medical industry.

My cancer, while inconvenient, was an unexpected gift. It taught me not to take life for granted, to be an advocate for my own health, and the importance of paying it forward. Cancer also brought some of the most amazing people into my life — people who have become like family. And for that, I am grateful.

Breasts,
Once the soft curves of rolling hills,
Emerald and blossoming,
Abounding with streams.
Sustainers of life, sacred springs.

In losing you,
I lost a piece of me –
My femininity,
My identity;
Carved away with the tissue.

My chest,
Now a landscape of loss.
Once a warm embrace,
Soft with life,
Now replaced by
Windswept dunes,
Scorched and scarred,
Rivers run dry.

You have taught me that beauty is not in what we have,
But in what we endure.
I wear it in my scars –
Marks of courage and strength,
Each one tells of the battles fought,
The victories claimed.
Although my contours have changed,
Firmly I stand – imperfect, beautiful, whole.

Womb,
My secret garden,
Once a haven for blooming life,
Brimming with hope.

I long for the days before you were poisoned-

Polluted by rivers of chemo.
Now the gate remains locked.
I have forsaken you –
The weight of my grief, crushing. Forgive me though-
For I cannot handle more hurt.

Fertility, sacrificed for my survival.
Now a chasm has carved way,
Yawning and empty and echoing.
There is an aching stillness
Where once-fertile ground
Is now devoid of life.

But in your bareness, I find wholeness.
For you remind me that worth does not flow from my body,
But through my soul.
You have taught me that womanhood is not defined by motherhood,
But by the depths of my heart.

Oh, Body of mine,
A woman, merely budding.
Life was supposed to be about beginnings,
Not about battles,
And you betrayed me.
But too often I have cursed you.
So now, I honor you:
Not for what was taken, but for all that remains –
For unyielding strength,
For redefined womanhood.
My beautiful body,
You are a battlefield,
And you are sanctuary.

Cancer was and is…
  
Cancer was:   
The unknown the night I felt the lump.   
The waiting period between the prognosis to the final diagnosis.  
Saying it out loud for the first time.   
  
It was:   
That hug from the person I love most, thank you mom.   
The ongoing opinions, appointments, and questions that I wanted all gone.   
The strength I didn’t want to know I have.   
  
It was:   
The goodbyes of those I thought would walk this journey by my side.   
The support I received from those I never would have thought.   
The faith in my Lord and Savior who gave death a new perspective.
  
Cancer was all that and now is:   
Putting off IVF for 5 more years. Ouch, it still hurts.   
Reading that book, at that center, while I wait on that monthly dose.   
Being patient with my mind and body when the side effects kick in.
  
It is:   
Falling to my knees in prayer when dark thoughts creep in.   
Viewing the world through the lens of endless gratitude and love.   
Starting a bucket list and crossing items off.   
  
It is:   
Wishing I had a hand to hold and someone to say, “Babe, it’s all gonna be okay.”  
Appreciating these new scars for what they are, a reminder of how blessed I am to see another day.   
  
It is:   
Living for today.   
  
Cancer was and is for me:  
Praying that I one day get to say, “I once had breast cancer, but now I am cancer free.” 

You never really know where to start when asked to talk about your breast cancer journey. When I hear the word “journey,” often something with a beautiful connotation comes to mind. I don’t think most would look at cancer and think of anything beautiful, and I would say before my journey I would have agreed. Although there has been no shortage of pain, fear, anger, tears, sadness and confusion, the last almost 4 years have also been nothing short of something beautiful.

In October 2019, my son decided abruptly he was done breastfeeding. I was surprised but didn’t think much about it. About 2 weeks later I felt a lump, thinking it was likely a clogged milk duct. I brushed it off, trying to pump here and there to see if that would help. There was never any pain or other concerning symptom. About a month later I realized it seemed to be getting noticeably bigger and made an appointment with my OBGYN. After an ultrasound which turned immediately into a mammogram, a breast MRI, and two biopsies, I was diagnosed at the age of 31 with stage III invasive ductal carcinoma and HER2+.

Having been a nurse for almost 10 years at the time, you would think I would have at least a small frame of reference with cancer. The only frame of reference I had, apart from what is shown on TV and in movies, was the small amount of clinical time I had on the oncology floor as a nursing student. At that time, I told myself I would NEVER want to be a part of a world seemingly full of pain, sorrow and loss.

When I began consult after consult, appointment after appointment, and then eventually treatment, I found myself in THAT world. Even having a decade of medical background, I had so many questions, anxieties, and fears. I needed a connection to tether me to something tangible. I needed something that made me feel grounded and safe, like the plan in place for my health had hope of success and a way to give me more time here on this earth with my family.

I found exactly what I needed at the Tri-Cities Cancer Center. I found solace, compassion, strength and literal earthly angels to lift me up when I felt like I had no control over a single thing in my life. I found people who cared for me as a person and made me feel like I wasn’t just another patient to push through a busy schedule. I found a family and team of the most generous, kind, loving people, the majority of which have either had a loved one go through treatment or have personally gone through cancer treatment. I found camaraderie with those who had walked this path before and stood in front of me healthy and well, having hope that could be me too.

I completed 6 rounds of chemotherapy, a double mastectomy, 28 rounds of radiation, and a full year of targeted therapy infusions to give me a chance at life again. I remember right before finishing treatment I asked my husband, “How do I repay all the kindness and support that has been shown to me?” He simply replied, “You don’t repay kindness. You pay it forward.” And that’s when I knew what I needed to do.

Roughly a year later, I landed a job at the cancer center as an infusion nurse. Having been there now about a year and a half, I can confidently say that being able to be a part of and supporting others on one of the hardest journeys of their life has been such a gift to me. It has been a way to help me heal and claim back some of the things I feel like I lost in my own journey. It has given me the opportunity to pay forward the care that I received and so desperately needed when I felt like I had no tether to any sense of control or outcome of my own life. And although I know I get way more out of it than I give, I always felt if I could make even ONE person’s journey a little lighter, I will feel like I am paying forward what was so generously gifted to me.

Cancer is like a cancer

Cancer is like a cancer.

It starts in one spot and spreads, not just through your body but through your life. It hijacks your cells, your plans, your identity.

It takes the people you love. It took my people: My dad, my uncle, my aunt, my in-laws, my friend Libby.

Cancer comes in all kinds, in all stages. Within my circle it’s been breast, colon, thyroid, brain, kidney, ovarian, leukemia, sarcoma, skin, and some I’d never heard of before joining the Cancerverse: leptomeningeal, synovial sarcoma, neuroendocrine, Li-Fraumeni Syndrome, which isn’t cancer but a genetic mutation that comes with a high risk of getting it.

Cancer marches up and down both sides of my family tree, leaving diseased body parts and people in its wake. My own body harbors a gene passed down through generations that increases my risk and eventually that risk became my reality.

A cancer diagnosis is undeniably life-altering, but it is also life-affirming and brings a sharp focus to the things that matter most. I’ve met extraordinary people whose paths I never would have crossed otherwise.

When I started chemo, my husband and three friends shaved their heads in solidarity. Others showed up in all the quiet, generous ways that speak volumes: bringing meals, sending cards, care packages, texts and funny memes, watching our daughters so I could rest, or simply sitting beside me during treatment. They surrounded me with love exactly when I needed it most. Through the hardest days, my husband, family and friends reminded me – not just in words, but in action – how deeply I am loved. That kind of love changes you forever.

My story

My cancer story isn’t your cancer story. 

But in some ways, it is every survivor’s story – an invisible thread connecting each of us: the same fear, dread, despair, anger, hope, conviction.

An MRI found my breast cancer which had already spread to my lymph nodes – just two months after an “all clear” and “everything looks good” mammogram showed nothing. 

I was 43. 

My cancer battle plan included multiple surgeries, nearly five months of chemotherapy and 33 blasts of targeted radiation to my chest wall. 

To put this into perspective, the dosage was about 100,000 times more radiation than what a typical human absorbs in a lifetime. My left chest wall may now qualify for its own Marvel origin story.

During my first visit with my surgeon, he dropped a bead into my palm from a tackle box to illustrate my tumor size – it was a sinister pearl. 

My best cancer friend Teresa’s was the size of a golf ball. We joked a lot about hers being bigger than mine during our treatment. Gallows humor and trauma bonding get you through the darkest days.

A port in the storm

A purple mediport used to be buried under my skin near my right collarbone. Its tube slipped into one of my central veins to become a superhighway for the chemo drugs to enter my bloodstream – the drugs that saved my life, the drugs I dreaded.

It stuck out like a hard button beneath my thin skin. When my daughters, ages 6 and 8, would barrel into my arms for a hug, they would inevitably hit it, sending white-hot pain in all directions.

When my surgeon removed the port a year later, I brought along Misty and Andrea, fellow breast cancer survivors. The snaking of the tube as it slithered out of my body was among the weirdest sensations I’ve experienced – a tapeworm being pulled out from within. I asked to keep the port, the doc bagged it, and I carried it out of the clinic like a badge of honor from my war years. Then my friends and I went out for drinks and cupcakes. 

The fight’s aftermath

You’re told to fight and you do ­– and then everyone calls you a survivor.

You smile. You celebrate. You post the victory on social media. You think you are done.

But no one tells you that surviving cancer can feel like its own kind of cancer.

Because it doesn’t end when the treatment does. It’s just where a different kind of struggle begins.

Post-cancer PTSD is real. Every headache is a brain tumor. Every phantom pain is suspicious.

Every scan, lab and oncology visit brings anxiety.

Your body, once familiar, is now untrustworthy because it betrayed you. 

Numbness invades places that once felt sensation. Scars and radiation tattoos mark your post-cancer body. Fatigue seeps into bones, then post-cancer drugs make them brittle. 

The body that once felt like yours no longer responds the way it used to. There’s grief in that.

You tell yourself this is healing, but this, too, becomes a kind of mutation because it’s not a return to before. 

Survivor guilt metastasizes into an impossible question: Why did I survive and not them? Each loss is another scar to carry.

Milestones

Survival spreads into days, months, weeks, years, milestones – if you’re lucky.

This October marks my 11th year post-diagnosis.

The most important advice I can give anyone facing down this disease is to be your own best advocate.

If something doesn’t feel right in your body, keep pushing to get the tests to figure out what’s wrong. Trust your instincts and your doctor – or find a new one you can trust.

Surviving cancer also means carrying the tattered map to help others who come behind you through it, a most sacred duty. 

You put their chemo dates in your calendar. You show up on chemo day. You check in the next day. You hold their hand during a biopsy. You rally them when they need it. You listen. You make them laugh. You validate their fears.

You bear witness because sometimes the only gift you can give is the permission to feel the fear and to show them there is life on the other side. And it’s not the same life but they will figure this out on their own.

People expect you to be grateful (you are). To be positive (you are). To move on (you try to). 

You learn to lean harder into gratitude, to embrace each day, to stop postponing your own life, to let go of the things that don’t matter because it’s more clear what those things are.

But here’s the truth: Survivorship is a long-term side effect of cancer, and you must continue to carry it because cancer is like a cancer, and you don’t have any other choice.

A routine obligation…

It’s spring of 2018 and I’m 39 years old. In hindsight I would say I didn’t have a care in the world; this wasn’t really true, as I had a demanding job and a son getting ready for kindergarten in the fall. At my gynecological check up my doctor mentions my age and says she’ll put in the order for my first mammogram in the fall when I turn 40. I knew the time was coming, I’m glad it will be in the works, and I’ll worry about it later.

To my surprise I get a call to schedule my mammogram just a few weeks later. I don’t bother mentioning that they’ve called six months early. I figure it’s easier to just go ahead and get it done rather than have to remember to call later in the year. Soon after, I’m in a weird cape thing smushed against a machine. I’ve had breast exams before, but this was a new experience. A necessary evil I figure. At the end of the scan the technician mentions not to be surprised if they called me back. Turns out I have dense breasts (who knew!) and it helps to get more images to establish a baseline or something. Sure, I figure, whatever. I know now she was giving me a clue in a puzzle that would unravel over the next several months.

I have a choice to make…

I do get called for another scan and some internal instinct kicks in. Even though I was prepared by the comment by the earlier tech, I’m a little worried and I bring my husband, Ian, to the second scan. The process is the same as the first: same weird cape/gown thing, same smooshing and pulling at the machine, and maneuvering by body in weird and uncomfortable ways to get the images they want. Then they bring me back to the little changing room where my husband is waiting and they let me know the radiologist will be in to talk to me. “Okay, this is interesting,” I think. After a while he comes in and kneels in front of me as I’m seated on the little couch and goes over the scans. He’s using medical terms I don’t really get; I can see he’s trying to boil it down for me and I do my best to follow along. Turns out there is something there. They aren’t sure what it is. There’s no lump that I can feel, just what I understand to be bad tissue at the back of my breast. “Huh, that’s weird,” I think. He talks for a long time, I’m thinking he’s giving us (me) a lot of attention. He finishes by saying in his estimation there is a 10% chance that this is something bad (cancer.) I have two options: I can go for a breast biopsy or I can wait six months and get another mammogram. Seems it’s likely to not be a big deal, but better safe than sorry, right? I look at my husband and decide on a biopsy. “That doesn’t sound fun,” I think.

I was thinking about Justin Timberlake…

Ian comes with me to the biopsy. I don’t know exactly what I’m in for, but I figure some support would be nice and maybe we can go out for lunch after. They bring us to a room with a small sitting area outside of a tall machine and hand me another cape/gown thing. There are two nurses and the radiologist. “Lots of activity,” I think. They lead me to a chair that brings my chest close to a machine and push and press and adjust so that the back of the chair is firmly keeping me pressed against the machine. The doctor says there is going to be a popping noise, they are going to put the needle in, then take an x-ray to make sure it’s in the right place, and finally take the sample. “Okay,” I think. One of the nurses comes to sit next to me, takes my hand, and starts chatting. “This is a lot of personal attention,” I say to myself. She’s chatting away, telling me I’m doing great. The popping sound comes with a stinging pain, even numbed by the lidocaine. The process repeats: popping, handholding, everyone stepping out during the x-ray, rinse and repeat. I can’t really feel it, but something is happening. I’m getting warm. The nurse is trying to distract me. We were talking about music. Then she’s saying “stay with me” and I can feel the curtains falling over my eyes. Next thing I know I’m laying down on a bed a few feet from the machine. The first thing I said was, “I was thinking about Justin Timberlake.” Lesson learned, for me at least, they can numb the pain, but my body still responds. And it can only take so much before it’s done.

So many tests…

The biopsy showed cancer. When they called me in for the results, the doctor talked for a long time and I had trouble following, but he said something about pre-cancer. I tried to recap the conversation and said, “So, I have pre-cancer.” And I can tell he wishes he didn’t have to say it, but he says no, you have stage 1 cancer. I’m stunned. Floored. Silenced. All I wanted to do was escape from this news and pretend it wasn’t true. I told Ian I wanted to pick our son up from daycare and go see whatever movie was playing. The next weekend we went on a road trip out to the Puget Sound. I waited to tell my family; I couldn’t quite process it. As I went through tests and met with a surgeon and an oncologist, had MRI’s and other scans done, I had trouble making sense of what this meant. Is it a big deal? How can it not be a big deal? It’s cancer. But it’s stage 1? Maybe this is not a big deal. It’s very treatable. What does treatable mean? Is this going to change my lifespan? Why am I suddenly so tired? Is it because of this cancerous tissue inside me? Is it the stress? How much should I be freaking out? All I could do was either obsess about it or shut down. 

Through the tunnel and beyond…

In September I had a lumpectomy. A month later, I completed three weeks of daily radiation treatments. The surprise of that experience is the three blue dots now tattooed below my breasts to help align the radiation machine. One of the last few radiation treatments was on my 40th birthday. It was not the celebration I’d planned, but I was starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel: a  tunnel that had twists I didn’t expect and a tunnel that would lead to a path I never expected with future MRI’s and mammograms every six months, reminding me that this could be lurking to challenge me again. But it also reminded me not to squander anything. Time, energy, love, fun. I had faced a challenge. I had amazing support. I had terrific care. I joined a new community of survivors. In addition to a new resolve to enjoy and appreciate my own experience, I also gained the knowledge and experience to help others. Nothing makes me happier than when someone tells me they scheduled their mammo. I’ve had the unfortunate opportunity to support friends who also had to face breast cancer. These are gifts I never asked for, but one that I have learned to appreciate and one that’s big enough to share. 

“At least you got a free boob job out of it!” 

A well-meaning friend said these words to me just a few months ago. I had mentioned that I was diagnosed with breast cancer over a decade ago and had a double mastectomy, chemotherapy and reconstruction surgery. I know my friend was trying to focus on the positive, and I gave them a smile before saying, “Yeah, but a lot of people think reconstruction is like a regular boob job, when it is not.”  I went on to explain the reconstruction process and my friend was taken aback.

I admit that I also most likely said and thought a “free boob job” was a perk breast cancer patients could look forward to. I probably even thought that when I was initially diagnosed with breast cancer at the age of 34. The beginning phase of being diagnosed and meeting with doctors about treatment options was a terrifying blur for me. I just wanted to live. I met my surgeon for the initial consultation and immediately asked, “Can you just take both of my boobs? I don’t want to spend the rest of my life worrying about finding another tumor.” 

Surgery and chemo were incredibly painful, but I was confident that my choices were my best chance at living to see my kids grow up. After several months of treatment, I found myself boob-less, hair-less and feeling like a walk around the block might as well be climbing Mount Everest. I didn’t feel human, much less feminine. But I didn’t care. I was going to live.

Several months after my last treatment, I started thinking about reconstruction surgery. I was feeling better, my hair was growing back, and I was only 35. After a year of looking and feeling like an alien, I wanted to look “normal” again. A lot of people (including women) do not realize that most dresses/shirts/tops in the women’s section are made specifically for people with breasts. The clothes look weird when you don’t have them. Like you are a 4-year-old playing dress up in your mother’s clothing.

I decided to do reconstruction surgery with implants. I don’t think I would make that decision again. I went through a process of “expanding” my chest muscle and skin, to make room for the implants. It was so painful that I would have a friend drive so I could down a few shots of vodka before heading into the office to have the doctor inject more saline to expand the area behind my chest muscles. I also had several additional surgeries after the final implants were placed because my right implant would not anchor and would slide down my body. The surgeon finally had to use cadaver material to secure the implant in place.

The end results don’t really look like boobs with my shirt off. I feel like the only similarities my reconstructed breasts have with my natural ones are that they are round and in the same general location. There is rippling, there are no nipples, they are hard, and I can usually only feel them when it gets cold outside because they are freezing. My clothes do fit better, but I frequently find myself asking, “Was it worth it?”  Every time I had surgery, I was jeopardizing my life, and I spent several weeks in pain afterwards. For what? To look better in clothes?

Reconstruction is a personal choice.  I wish the public would realize this is not a typical boob job. Instead of being a perk at the end of fighting breast cancer, it is another set of doctors, hospitals, scars and pain. The end results frequently disappoint and are a far cry from the boobs that almost killed you.

TIFFANY

“Mom, I can’t catch your cancer,” my son, who was ten years old at the time, said to me one evening after a counseling session at the cancer center. To this day it still kind of makes me giggle, but when I think about it, I can see why he would have thought that.

I used to ask my kids to wash their hands as soon as they came home from school to try to keep my house as sterile as possible so I wouldn’t get sick. I was a single mother of three in a career that is paid by commission only, undergoing chemotherapy, radiation, a single mastectomy, and reconstruction. The fear of what was going to happen with our livelihood and the well-being of my children was fed by the need to survive breast cancer.

My cancer journey started with my first mammogram at 40 years old. It was a nightmare and emotional rollercoaster of tears and anger and feeling the “Why me?” I never smoked, rarely drank, had no family history, and took care of my body. I went to the doctor regularly, had yearly exams, and did self-breast exams. I found myself surrendering and asking the lord, “Help walk me through this journey.”

I remember the surgeon telling me to get my power-of-attorney and living will prepared in the same breath as she told me she would see me in two weeks for a mastectomy. Within a month of being diagnosed, I found myself in the operating room scared to death, laying there alone with tears running down my face. It is one thing when you go into surgery and come out with a scar; it’s another thing when you go in and come out missing a body part.

I can still remember the first glance at the large scars on my chest, my first chemo infusion, and when my hair fell out in clumps like it was yesterday. There was so much fear and pain in the unknown of what I was going to have to endure next. I was constantly worried about how my children were watching and not fully understanding what was happening.

All through treatment I worked from home and went into the office when I was able. There were mornings that I woke up and would go to the bathroom only to have to lay down and wait for my body to adjust before showering and then lay down once more before I could finish getting ready. I just yearned to feel normal and to do the things I once was able to do. I yearned to support my kids, do work and family life, heck even clean my house and mow my lawn! It was so difficult for me, a person that was once so independent, to have to ask for help and rely on other people to do things for me.

The strength and inner personal courage one has to find during a cancer diagnosis is overwhelming. However, this journey brought people into my life and friends stepped up more than I ever could have imagined or hoped for. The outpouring of love and help I received was humbling. It is a path in life that no one can explain, one that you don’t wish on your worst enemy, and yet one that has molded me into who I am today.