About my mom

At the end of October of 2000, my mom's mammogram picked up a mass. The doctor decided to do an excisional biopsy, and discovered that she had not one, but 2 types of cancer. Ductal Carcinoma In Situ (garden variety, slow growing cancer) and an invasive type. Her regular doctor, who was also the town surgeon (yep, rural living) wanted to act immediately to remove the breast. She told him he had to wait. And she told him that he could not tell ANYONE about the cancer.

Why? Because I was getting married on November 4. She told us all was fine, so as to not put any damper on my wedding. She was my maid of honor, and at the wedding was still bleeding and oozing from the biopsy site - she wore a maxi pad in her bra to be sure she didn't get any blood on the dress. Again - she didn't tell anyone about this. Not even my father.

She didn't tell my father because he is a lousy liar. Mostly because he's unfailingly honest. In fact, during my honeymoon - after Mom finally told him - I called to check in and heard my dad in the background say "Did you tell her??" She could've killed him, I'm told. I knew at that point, intuitvly that she had breast cancer.

The morning after we returned from our honeymoon, I called my parents and my mother told me she had breast cancer and was having a mastectomy in 3 days. I lost it. Poor Steve came out of the bedroom to find his wife just screaming and sobbing. Mom told me to give him the phone, and she filled him in and suggested he slap me or something.

I went home 2 days later, and stayed for a couple of weeks to help take care of her and the farm. Poor hubby.

She had a mastectomy and luckily it had not spread to the lymph nodes. She opted against reconstruction.

She's been cancer free since then.

All through it, she told me that she just KNEW everything would be ok. She wasn't scared. She was pretty upbeat through all of it. I have literally see her handle hurt toes worse.

So now I'm on the other side of this table. And I'm not telling mom. Not because of a wedding (that's one reason I'm not telling Steve's family - his sister gets married on Saturday). She's been really sick for over a year now. Not cancer related - COPD, Heart Failure, and a lot of related and unrelated ailments. She's in pretty poor mental state because of it all, and popping plenty of xanax to deal with the anxiety of her own health. She doesn't need to worry about me too, or God-forbid, blame herself for it somehow. I'll wait until we know what we're dealing with.

Its hard not having Mom for this though. And of course I can't tell Dad because he would spill it.

So that's Mom's story. She's where I get my strength, and I'm grateful for her calmness during her cancer, because that has spread to me, to an extent.