The Thing About Cancer - Part 1

[Chuck Stromme]

“What’s that?” she asks herself in her quiet evening moment. “A rash?”

“Wait, that’s something under the skin. What the heck, some kind of infection? Wait a minute, that’s some kind of lump I think, but what makes a lump? No, couldn’t be. I already had cancer once, 13 years ago, and I’ve been cancer free since then. Couldn’t be cancer.” She can’t sleep that night.

She tells her husband early the next morning, a Monday. “We need to talk.” Those are frightening words for husbands, usually meaning they have screwed up or forgotten something important. He doesn’t want to answer, especially before coffee, but he’s trapped. How can he short-circuit this conversation? Women.

“I found a lump.” This short sentence suddenly changes both of their lives forever. Once spoken it cannot be withdrawn or ignored. Plans set in stone crumble before this announcement, lives are irrevocably altered, mortality is confronted. He forgets about being frightened by “We need to talk.”

He puts down the paper, pushes his coffee aside. He’s afraid. Then, “What kind of lump?”

She cries softly. “I don’t know. It’s way high on my breast, not where I thought a tumor might be, but it’s there.”

“Show me.” He feels the spot. Yes, something odd, right there, a raggledy bump down inside. He says it feels too ordinary to be a tumor, doesn’t it? Neither has ever felt a breast tumor before.

Their family doctor sees her later that day. “Hmmm, something all right. Let’s get you to a specialist tomorrow.” Tomorrow? So soon? “Don’t we have something else scheduled?” No honey, we don’t.

The regular mammogram confirms… something, just like the GP said. The sonic mammogram shows it live and captures the video, like the pictures of babies in utero. Only this isn’t a baby. This is a walnut-sized monster that’s trying to eat her. Damn.

A needle biopsy is next. It hurts as they take out five stringy bits of the something and send it to pathology. You don’t get to meet “Pathology”, probably because they don’t want to see the recipients of their news. Pathology says cancer, no doubt about it. Double damn.

They learn new words and new meanings together: Invasive ductal carcinoma, stage 2, triple negative, aggressive. They revisit old words: Chemo, radiation, treatment plan, prognosis.

The appointments begin. The chemo guy, the radiation guy, the surgeon again. The surgeon is taking a week off so surgery will be delayed. The surgeon has a life, of course, but how threatening is a delay? Doesn’t matter. A vacation is planned and must be taken. A week is added to the fright time.

Family and friends must be told. Prayer chains and good wishes appear from the near and dear and from those not so. Flowers, offers of support, visits and casseroles. It is all so incongruous with how she feels, which is generally great. How can that be, feeling great on a beautiful spring day with the best time of year visible from here? Feel great but got cancer? It’s so unreal.

That’s the thing about cancer, I guess. It can be trying to kill you while you’re blissfully unaware of its presence, while you’re living a normal life with a normal future on the horizon. This one doesn’t hurt a bit. It just lies there, growing, thriving, getting to know you, planning its next stage, hoping you’ll keep thinking “It’s nothing. My mom never had breast cancer.”

He’s not as sweet and considerate as you would hope. He’s irritable, even angry. Anger is an easy escape when you won’t deal with your other emotions. He tells his VA PTSD group about it, about how guilty he feels and how hopeless. One man asks “Have you told her how you feel?” Stupid question. Of course not.

He’s the senior member of the group, with 14 years of counseling treatment behind him. He knows stuff. It’s not unknown for others to seek his guidance. The group is powerful in his life. They have pulled his sheets too many times to count. They know about helplessness and they know him.

They give him the single most valuable piece of advice he has ever received: “Your wife is scared. You have two choices. You can either hole up and be afraid for her alone or you can tell her you’re afraid and be afraid with her. Your choice. Which do you think she wants?” That night he tells her. They cry together.

The dreaded Tuesday finally arrives. Surgery is scheduled for 9:30 in the morning. They arrive at 7:30 and she checks in. They aren’t alone in the pre-op waiting room.

At last, “That’s you, honey. She just called your name.”

[Ransom Southerland]

Morning Chuck,

I just read this and I'm thinking, "WHAT?! Why didn't he write more? Finish?"

We walked with you through this, but what you're writing is important for me to read and I want to encourage you to keep it at it until you're caught up to the present.

Ransom