BREAST Cancer: Yesterday’s Risqué - Today’s Yawn

Artist AleXsandro Palombo  series called “Survivor” that imagines what well-known female cartoon personalities ...

A few decades ago I deleted an entire segment in the TicklesTabitha’s Cancer-tankerous Mommy manuscript, because talking about breasts in a children’s book about breast cancer was just too risqué.

When it comes to addressing topics others deem risqué or offensive, it appears I’m no longer a step ahead of popular perception, but have fallen on my unbleached butt and can’t get up.

I've fallen and can't get up!

Now that I’m almost retired, I spent my summer arranging potential “Summer Adventures 2016” journal entries for my grown children, ensuring my landscaping survived the hottest East TN summer in years, doing DIY projects in the basement, and -every once in a while- checking in to see what type of stories and/or experts the media is looking for these days.

Some of what I learned sure was… educational.

For example, I learned that freelancers were looking for experts on butt bleaching. Even more enlightening, I learned that I need not have bothered running a google search on butt bleaching, I could have just asked my children what that was.

In my previous blog, I gave some of the backstory and backlash regarding the controversy surrounding my children’s book about nuclear power plants.  In the wake of Fukushima it is not difficult to understand why a children’s book about nuclear power plants might not be a welcome edition on everyone’s book shelf, but a children’s book about cancer?  

“Why would you ever want to do a book about nuclear power,” asked one of my colleagues, “after establishing a career based on a sweet, beloved, children’s book about cancer?”

His comment only goes to show: Yesterday’s controversial and risqué is today’s yawn.

In the late 1990’s, when I first pitched my sweet, beloved children’s book about cancer it was not considered so sweet. It is unimaginable today, but back in 1994 when I was diagnosed with breast cancer, it was discussed in hushed tones amongst adults, over the heads of bewildered children.

Talking to children about nuclear power would have been far less controversial than a children’s book about cancer. Especially one that included the emotional mood swings (depression) pictured in Tickles Tabitha’s Cancer-tankerous Mommy.  If cancer wasn’t depressing enough, one critic (another writer) told me the mommy in my story (a nicer version of myself) was just too mean!  

I did receive some positive critiques from several well-respected mainstream publishing houses. They loved the story, but there just wasn’t a market for it. After all, young mothers with children didn’t usually get breast cancer… I was just unlucky.  They left out the part about me being unlucky.

I didn’t know it at the time, but for any unknown aspiring author to receive any comments at all from an editor was huge. I thought they felt sorry for the cancer mommy, so I packed up my manuscript and focused on LIVING.  

Today it’s common knowledge that young women do get breast cancer, good moms aren’t always nice, and even moms without cancer get depressed. If you’re in the book business you know that editor’s affiliated with large publishing houses care about marketing potential and not the feelings of aspiring writers, whether they are dead or alive!  

Just about everything I experienced back then sounds unbelievable to young people today, and makes for humorous story-telling. If only living it had been as funny! This October it will be fifteen years since my children's book on cancer was published, and made its debut on the Rosie O Donnell talk show. 

We used to have a saying when I was a kid: Last laugh’s the dog’s laugh.  Woof, woof, is sort of how I feel when I reflect on my experience writing and publishing Tickles Tabitha’s Cancer-tankerous Mommy!  

October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month! 

And a reminder to women of all ages to examine their breasts!

Surviving Breast Cancer: Long Live the Sitcom Queen!

“Your odds are good, but I wouldn’t go to Vegas if I were you,” said the oncologist with the best bedside manner NEVER… At least according to some patients – but he and I shared the same perverse sense of humor!

Twenty-two years later… I’m thinking I should have gone to Vegas!

January is my Breast Cancer Anniversary.

Before the movie popularized the term “bucket list,” I had one! Luckily, I had checked the really death-defying ones – sky diving, for example – off early.  Back when I was young, invincible, and coordinated –and before a husband, children, and a reason to live!

This year I decided to celebrate life in 2016 by stepping out of my comfort zone and doing something fun once a week – or at the very least once a month. The only thing that’s kept me off the couch and out the door so far is my daughter Tabitha.

One week we hiked and last week we went ice skating for the first time in years. 

It is becoming clear to me that the longer I live the more death defying things I used to consider fun have become.  Even hiking my neighborhood is beginning to make me feel like a wuss. Not just the actual hike – which is the equivalent of walking up the black diamond of a ski slope – but the wild animals my neighbors keep reporting they’ve seen! Anyone else seen, The Revenant?

  
In 1994, I remember bartering with God and suggesting he let me live long enough to see Tabitha get married.

She’ll turn 26 in April. Perhaps this sheds a little light on why her mom, unlike my own mother (who never missed an opportunity) has never ever demanded she catch the bridal bouquet.  

Yesterday we had our first snow, and the roads off our mountain were impassable. Snow days make it easy for me to stay home and write; unless I’ve found a lump in my breast and I’m scheduled for a biopsy.

 In January 1994, that is exactly what happened.  The snow could not melt soon enough that year.

I recall lying on the examination table of the doctor’s office where I had gone for my biopsy. Thank goodness he had removed the needle, before I heard Tabitha howling in agony!

My husband had dropped me off and taken our children to get some breakfast. Tabitha had insisted on a chocolate (no shock here as she’s my daughter) milkshake. It was still freezing cold outside and her fingers had stuck to the milkshake cup.  

Nope, she was not wearing gloves, and more than likely she had argued about wearing a coat too.  Her argument being that the inside of it was too cold.  

I’m sure every woman between Mickie D’s and the Doctor’s office swooned at how adorable it was that my husband let her get away with this sort of thing.  However, I can tell you, I would have and did receive the stink-eye every single time I allowed either kid to win one of these arguments.  

Present-day, Tabitha has been assisting me with the manuscript of a children’s book I wrote for her years ago. I had all but forgotten about it, but it was one of her favorites.  It is a feminist fairytale about a hard-headed princess and her adoring father. 

How did I ever come up with that idea? 

There was no Queen in the story.  One can assume she died from breast cancer.

Lucky for me, my life was not a fairytale, but more like a sitcom.  Long live the Queen!

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It's true that breast cancer changes your life. It certainly changed mine.

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Register here:  http://yourlifeafterbreastcancer.com/blog/surviving-to-thriving-telesummit/
If you register for this event you will learn from some Amazing Women Thrivers… I am so pleased to be counted as part of an amazing group of women who will share inspirational stories of surviving breast cancer to achieve phenomenal success while creating amazing lives on their terms. We will share how we overcame struggles and went on to create extraordinary lives. The details are below:

April 19 Finding Your Life Purpose Join us for two amazing stories that will leave you motivated and ready to become a thriver. Leave with the hope and inspiration you need to take your next step!

April 20 Following Your Passion Join us for an hour of "passionate pursuits" as we learn from women who have taken their diagnosis and turned it into a new path.

April 21 Finding Your Voice: Ever wondered how to turn your journey with breast cancer into a book? Join two thrivers as they share tips and hints on how to write the story inside you.

April 22 Being Unstoppable In the Face of Adversity: Hear from two amazing women entrepreneurs. Learn how nurturing an outlook of being unstoppable will help you take the next steps to becoming a thriver.

April 23 Turning Breast Cancer into a Gift: You will leave with new ideas and new ways to view your breast cancer journey, along with the inspiration and motivation you need to redesign your life and start thriving.

If this is compelling to you or if you know someone who this would profoundly impact their life, please join the FREE call. Registration information can be found at the following link: http://yourlifeafterbreastcancer.com/blog/surviving-to-thriving-telesummit/

It’s been a year filled with emotional and sometimes turbulent life changes. I’ve been every bit the Cancer-tankerous Mommy I wrote about in the book- only this time it’s not cancer or Meds- it’s just me being my mean ole self.

My husband’s career had us in Texas last summer, but before summer had ended he was on his way to Alabama, and the kids and I back to North Carolina. We’re together, we’re just not living together- we’re a commuter family. When he’s not flying to North Carolina, I’m flying to Alabama or Florida where my parents live.

Our daughter, Tabitha graduated high school mid-semester this year, and enrolled in college. I feel fortunate; somehow I’ve managed not to run her off- yet. North Carolina State where she attends college is just a short distance, and Tabitha lives at home. She is majoring in psychology and plans to be a Psychiatrist. Not a surprise-she’s already done the research- as life with her own family isn’t always easy.

Some of my friends have confessed they couldn’t wait for their kids to leave the nest- I’m not one of them. I've been advised to enjoy the moments I have now, but I haven't taken that advice. I’ve been down right bitchy about it. My husband made the mistake of attempting to make me feel better by reminding me, in two years both children would be in college, and we could easily move to wherever his career takes him. I don’t know what he was thinking, but I was thinking it would be the first time we’d move without our kids. It didn’t make me happy!

I could pretend as a cancer survivor, I am exempt from such feelings, because I realize how lucky I am to have had these years- watch my children grow up, and grow old with the ones I love- but I would be lying.

I am grateful, to celebrate Mother’s Day this year, surrounded by my children, and with the knowledge my mother is still with me, but this year I got a glimpse of life without them, and was not prepared.

My mother, Amelia Patricia Solomon a.k.a. Granny Pat of Walnut Hill, Florida is alive, and while not completely well, is finally home after months in a hospital, and is recovering from a near fatal bout of Bacterial Meningitis diagnosed as Pneumococcal Meningitis.

I will not forget my mother looking at me, her only daughter, without recognition. Nor will I forget the the moment I knew she recognized me. In a year filled with heart wrenching good byes- what a relief when my mamma said hello.

This year I said good bye to my paternal aunt, Juanita Pacetti- a best friend, confidante and on occasion surrogate mother. High School graduation meant saying good bye to my little girl; all too soon she’s become a young woman. Faced with my mother’s life threatening illness, I was forced to say good bye to my own childish self. Abruptly, my siblings, and I were required to face facts- our parents are elderly, and we are now the grown ups.

It's been a year filled with emotional and turbulent life changes. I would like to write I have handled them with dignity, grace, and courage- but the older I get the less inclined I feel to whitewash the truth.

I’ve had to say good bye to people, places, and parts of myself that can no longer exist.
Undignified, inept, and scared is how I’ve felt much of the year.

Recently my 16 year old son, Jordan told me, (after a brief outing where I sat in the passenger seat while he drove) “You’re like one of those really old people who appear to be crazy – but it’s because they’re so old. Only you do it, and you’re not even that old- YET! You’re just crazy.”

Well at least I'm not a sissy.

One of the Mother’s Day cards I purchased this year reads- Mother’s Day Is Not For Sissies.

No, it's for women like me and the one who mothered me.

Happy Mother's Day Granny Pat!

Time goes by so quickly. It’s busy at our house. I’ve been writing – just not Blogging. I had a group of neighbor kids over and they were my Focus Group for some of the activities I’ve incorporated into my school program curriculum. My teenagers videotaped the event and the kids were so wonderful and well behaved that I couldn’t help but think anyone watching would think it was staged. But…then one child announced that her entire family was crazy and another agreed and told us that her friend’s Daddy put crayons up his nose.

My little focus group ranged from pre-K to 4th Grade. We read my children’s book, played games, discussed cancer, and talked about how it affected families. I didn’t have to define cancer to a single child because they knew what it was and several had experienced it first hand because a family member had been diagnosed with cancer.

Yesterday, in the midst of planning Nutcracker Publishing’s 2nd Annual Easter Egg, Hunt for a Cure, I stopped to watch Democratic presidential contender, John Edwards and his wife Elizabeth’s press conference regarding her recurrence of breast cancer.

It’s been 13 years since I was diagnosed with Breast Cancer and I still feel queasy when I step into any doctor’s office for a routine breast exam or blood work.

Elizabeth Edwards was candid, gracious, and handling her recurrence of breast cancer with what I know to be a Cancer-tankerous Mommy’s attitude. She’s not going to be waiting to die, but instead is hitting the rode for her husband, and campaigning with cancer.

She’s not wallowing in pity either and I know cancer survivors everywhere sighed with relief when she announced her plans to continue to campaign.

Her honesty and candor about her breast cancer has helped so many families. Like the families of the children in my focus group.

A couple of years ago, it would have been unimaginable for me to invite the neighbor kids over for a school program party with a focus on cancer, much less enter a public school and talk to elementary students about cancer. Back when I was diagnosed with breast cancer, talking about it to my own young children was not exactly encouraged, and most well meaning adults tiptoed around the issue.

Next year I'll officially introduce Crack Open a Book©, Nutcracker Publishing’s Character Education School Program and I’ll be talking to elementary students about CANCER.

Thanks to the courage of women like Elizabeth Edwards the only tiptoeing around the issue I’ll do is a Cancer-tankerous inspired game called, Tiptoe to Mama.