How I’m Coping with Cancer in the Family

I just finished reading my daughter’s blog (@touchmyboobs.org/) about her upcoming double mastectomy. As a mom, I feel helpless and sad, wanting — no — needing to write. I don’t know where to begin. How do I put into words, the anguish of my heart as a mother and my own feelings that want to stay hidden away, as if somehow, that will make the reality less real.

I am grappling with the news that my daughter has breast cancer. I’ve known for a couple of weeks, but my compartmentalizing coping mechanism kicked in when I heard. Don’t get me wrong. My first reaction was to feel weak in the knees and sick to my stomach. Then, I went numb. I immediately put it in my mental file drawer marked “Serious Illness: Do not open until further notice.” The thing is, I never know when that “notice” will come. You see, my husband, the father of my four daughters, died of cancer six years ago. It was a long road leading up to it and a short road ending it. He was sick with serious health issues for most of our 29 year marriage, and my daughters each had health challenges of their own, but we were determined not to be victims, so we soldiered on and tried our best to be “normal”. That’s how I learned how to compartmentalize, because how else could I survive a sick husband, sick children, financial problems and the background fear of uncertainty that was always looming. The only way to do it was with a strong faith, a firm commitment to my husband (and him to me) and to our girls, and…with my “box”. That’s what I call the mental file drawer where I put my emotions when I either don’t want to deal with them, when I need time to let them simmer, or when I just can’t deal with them out of necessity and survival.

The good news for me is that I am a writer. That is how I cope. We are a family of writers. All of my daughters have the gift of language and wit. Each of them expresses themselves uniquely through their writing, which brings me to today. I found myself feeling down when I woke up, and even more so after reading my daughter’s blog. I felt like I was going through the motions, but not really present-just down. I’m not a person who typically gets down, but then again, I do have my box, so that’s one explanation, and I rely heavily on my faith. Being a counselor, I try to be aware of what I’m feeling, I just don’t always let the feelings come out, until the timing is “right,” or when the box gets too full…which is what happened two weeks ago when I was at mass by myself. I learned of my daughter’s diagnosis earlier in the week. I had already moved through the weak knees and sick stomach and put the leftovers in the box. But that Sunday, the “notice” came. The file drawer opened a crack, allowing memories and emotions to silently leak out with the tears that came without warning. I was feeling so sad for my daughter and for her husband. I was empathizing with what they were going through. And I was remembering. The memories flooded my brain — how many times had my husband and I sat in that church together, leaning on each other, leaning on our God, trusting in His plan for us, yet still being human in our fear of the unknown — of the road ahead. Mass was our saving grace. It centered us and helped us move forward in hope. I have so many memories of being in that church, praying for miracles, praying for acceptance, praying for hope, praying for peace and being together as one in that space. Our faith solidified our marriage and our family. It was only through our faith that we were able to endure the many, many trials that we faced. It was only through that faith, that I was able to accept my husband’s death and move through my grief. It was only through my faith that I was able to handle the my girls’ adversities — their physical and emotional struggles. So here I was again, in this sacred place, with memories of hardship; memories of my time with my husband, and memories of our family all together in that church. It was all too obvious that I was alone that day. It became all too clear that I have to deal with the fact that my daughter has breast cancer and I have to do it without her father. But, I have faith and so the tears fell and the emotions came and I moved through…for the time being.

I’ve have written before about the pain of motherhood. There is nothing more rewarding and nothing more difficult than being a mother. When I heard the news of Lindsey’s cancer, my immediate thought, after the initial shock, was, “This feels familiar”. There have been so many doctor visits with her, with her father, with her sisters. Health has not been on our side for many years. So when I found myself on familiar ground, the box locked more easily than I thought it should. It makes sense though. Old habits die hard. So while holding the box close, I struggle with trying to keep the “How much more can we take” feelings at bay and keep the “Trust in God in all things” ever present. I really don’t have any problem with the trust part. But I do have difficulty reconciling the human emotions that can try to override it. So that makes the box a little harder to open sometimes.

Lindsey has had many struggles in her 32 years. She, along with my youngest daughter, were diagnosed with PTEN Hamartoma Tumor Syndrome, or Cowden Syndrome, 2 years after their father died.There is a mutation with the tumor suppressor gene. This puts them at a greatly increased risk for many types of cancer, with breast cancer being the highest at up to 85% lifetime risk. We discovered completely by accident, through genetic testing for something else. What we now know is, my husband had this gene mutation as well, and it was passed on to them.

This news explained a lot about my husband’s chronic illnesses. It was a punch in the gut. We thought that all the health problems we faced for so many years, died with him. If he had to die, couldn’t the chronic health issues die too? Apparently not. They live on in our family. Each of us has some sort of chronic illness. That is our lot, but we try so hard not to let it define us. That’s where the box can be helpful. I think each of my girls has her own box. We are all learning how to open it and eventually empty it, but it isn’t easy and will be a lifelong process.

So now I prepare myself to support my precious first born as she faces the most difficult thing in her life (besides losing her father). She will be having a double mastectomy in three weeks. How do I wrap my brain around that?! She has written about it and about her feelings regarding it — at least the ones she’s able to name at this point. I am so moved by her courage, her determination, her candor and her sense of humor. I am so grateful for her husband, who is her rock and walks this journey right along side her, feeling her pain as his own. As her mom, I am feeling helpless. I am once again in familiar territory. So I will reach for the filing cabinet key sometime and let the emotions come, if the box doesn’t spring open by itself. In the meantime, I’ll acknowledge that I am sad, weary, and helpless. But I am also hopeful. I told my girls, “The bad news is, we’ve been through this before. But the good news is — we’ve been through this before.” My good friend likes to say, “Because you did that, you can do this.” Our experiences can either break us, or make us. I choose to learn from my experiences and let them make us better. I always look for the meaning and lesson. I’m not sure what the lesson is yet, but I do know that I will keep praying hard, keep trusting, and love my daughter with every fiber of my being, through this most difficult time.