I was doing fine at my every-three-month oncologist appointment yesterday. I kept my composure while telling my doctor all about my friend Amy who passed away just one month ago, after a short 15-month battle with breast cancer, at the tender age of 35. As I detailed the story about how Amy's cancer spread to her brain and lungs, how she was given just two to 12 months to live, how she didn't even survive for two months, I saw in his eyes that he knew exactly why I had hand-picked this story just for him. He knew I was trying to determine my own risk for this same outcome -- and so he was understanding and compassionate and comforting in a medical sort of way. And he was convincing -- when he told me he predicts I will absolutely not follow Amy's same path.
I did just fine for our whole exchange. Until this same man shifted from medical speak and asked me the four simple words that never fail to trigger a trail of unstoppable tears.
"How are you doing?" he asked.
He caught me off guard. I'm not sure I was prepared to dive beyond the surface of my emotions, to reveal my true fear of death from the same disease Amy was sure would not kill her. So I cried. And cried. A medical student fetched me a tissue, my doctor stood and touched my shoulder, and my three-year-old Danny watched with concern. I told everyone I was fine -- mostly, I am -- and I dried my tears. Before departing, my doctor hugged me and told me he'd send in a nurse to give me a flu shot.
Danny thought I cried because I was scared of the flu shot. Had it not been for his own appointment later in the day for the same flu shot, I would have let him believe this was the cause of my tears. Instead, I told him I was sad for a friend who was sick. And he was happy -- until a sharp needle pierced the skin of his little leg hours later.
Danny is happy once again. And I am happy too. My appointment revealed nothing suspicious, nothing worrisome, nothing except the fact that my oncologist thinks of me not just as a case, a statistic, a body that once harbored a disease. He thinks of me as a whole person. And that -- more than anything -- is what makes me cry.
Adriene Hughes was diagnosed with breast cancer shortly after her 44th year of living. She found her lump after participating in a 5K walk, which for some reason, caused her breast to swell. The swelling led her to the lump -- and that's how she discovered her cancer. Adriene lives in Southern California, works as a media specialist, and spends her time taking photographs, knitting, and baking cookies and breads.
