Chicken Soup for the Breast Cancer Survivor's Soul

by Jack Canfield

Pablo Picasso

  There isn’t a day that goes by in which “doodling” hasn’t helped me meet any new challenge that comes my way. Sound a bit crazy? Believe me, I was the first person who thought I must have lost my mind to think that something that sounds so frivolous and meaningless could become such a powerful learning tool. But it did! And now I travel across the United States and to other countries teaching people of all ages how they can reduce stress and develop more trust in the unpredictable, yet creative adventure called life.

  It all began in 1995 when I was first diagnosed with breast cancer, then continued in 1997 when I was, once again, diagnosed with cancer in my other breast. One day, while nervously waiting for test results at my doctor’s office, I found myself fidgeting with all the magazines, trying to focus on the words. After scanning through at least ten publications, I realized nothing was helping me relax and stay calm. My mind was beginning to run wild, imagining all sorts of worrisome scenarios. What if this happens? What if that happens? I’m sure if the nurse had taken my vital signs at that moment they would not have been considered “within normal limits.”

  I knew I needed to do something, so I asked the nurse for a piece of paper and pen. I returned to my seat and began to doodle. I had no idea what I was creating as I let the pen freely wander on the paper, yet out of nowhere abstract art seemed to materialize. I decided to have some fun and create one guideline: to begin and end the doodle outline at the same point in one continuous movement, without lifting the pen off the paper—and do it quickly. Who knows where that idea came from? I was beginning to have a lot of fun while I waited for the doctor. Then an amazing thing happened: while lost in this creative activity, I began to experience a sense of calm and peace. I noticed my preoccupation with negative thoughts subside.

  I knew I had stumbled onto something quite powerful, although I had yet to put all the pieces together. All I knew was that doodling helped bring me back to a more centered and peaceful space in the midst of a frightening and challenging medical situation.

  I continued to doodle after that day and bought a special spiral notebook that became my doodle book. I took it everywhere (the carwash, hairdresser, meetings), especially when I knew I’d be waiting. I even kept the doodle book with me as I lay on a gurney in the operating room before surgery. It became my constant companion—especially when waiting for daily radiation therapy at the hospital. I loved to doodle so much that I would even show up at the hospital early just to get in more doodle time.

  After a while, others began to take notice and admire some of the art I created. As each doubted their own ability, I’d put the pen and a blank piece of paper in their hand and say, “Now it’s your turn to create your own doodle!” The next day we all had something new to share with one another, and this simple, pleasurable activity became a powerful ice-breaker, opening up lines of communication, which for some led to personal friendships that continue to this day.

  As time went on, I decided to put all my doodles into a book as a way to honor this newfound magical world that somehow totally transformed my adventure through breast cancer. But what did I know about publishing a book? I wondered. I had no background in the publishing world. Then I stopped and thought about what the doodles had actually taught me. The pieces started to come together . . . one of those “light-bulb” moments. You see, I also spent many years studying and practicing meditation and Eastern philosophy, and the one teaching that kept bubbling to the surface time and time again—doodle after doodle—was the teaching of how powerful the present moment is—that NOW space in time. I also began to appreciate how all those scary what-if scenarios were nothing more than a projection into the unknown future. When I looked at this form of doodling, I began to appreciate that beautiful art had been created by simply letting go of control and having more faith and trust in the process itself—that journey between the beginning and end. And when I connected with that space in the middle, I also discovered inner strength, courage, wisdom and peace.

  Wow! What a major breakthrough that had been for me. I thought, If I can trust in the present moment and create amazing art without knowing the outcome ahead of time, then I should be able to take that same understanding and apply it to my life, especially my journey through a medical crisis. And it was true!

  That has been one of the most powerful gifts that came to me through breast cancer, and I continue to take that understanding to whatever challenge that knocks on my door. From the unexpected flat tire to dealing with elderly parent issues, doodling remains a constant and steady companion, reminding me that life is all about the journey and the choices we make along the way. Yes, it’s filled with many unexpected twists and turns, yet each can provide us with an opportunity to discover the greatness of who we truly are.

  Carol Ross Edmonston

  Becoming a Transformed Woman

  Believe in something larger than yourself.

  Barbara Bush

  I was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1992 at age thirty-eight. I underwent transformation surgery in July 1992. That’s what my husband Al called it, and it is the term I have since adopted. I use that phrase when I am with patients, whom I have the privilege to help at the Johns Hopkins Breast Center.

  Al told me, “The surgeon’s mission is to transform you from a victim into a breast-cancer survivor. You are exchanging your breast for another chance at life, and that is a fair trade.” Though disappointed I wasn’t a candidate for reconstruction, our daughter, Laura, age twelve, set me straight and wrote the following poem:

  Appearance

  Nobody’s perfect

  Just look at me

  But if you really think about it

  Who wants to be.

  Beauty and glamour

  Are nice to get

  But it’s what’s inside that counts

  You must never forget.

  I hope you understand

  What I’ve been trying to say

  I hope you get well soon

  And I love you more each day.

  Love, Laura

  Six weeks after surgery I was fitted for my breast prosthesis. I selected a name for her—“Betty Boob.” My silhouette was whole again, and I stood tall once more, all five feet, two inches of me. I was growing more confident week by week, and month by month, about my appearance and sexual being.

  At age forty, I had another bad mammogram. Betty Boob got a roommate, Bobbie Sue. To validate my womanhood and my husband’s love for me, he took me away to the Pocono Mountains (where the honeymooners go) for a long weekend. He said, “I’ve read before when you lose one of your senses, like your sense of sight or sense of smell, your other senses become more intensified. Maybe the same thing happens to your erotic zones. I intend to prove this hypothesis in the next forty-eight hours.” He did.

  In 2002, the opportunity to have DIEP flap reconstruction became an option for me, and I pursued it—first with hesitation, then with enthusiasm. I didn’t have the choice in 1992 or 1994 to do reconstruction with my mastectomy surgeries.

  My brain went into overdrive. Was it okay for me to pursue this? Did I deserve this opportunity? Am I being selfish? I prayed about it. I was leaving church one evening and asked God to please give me a sign that it was okay to proceed with the reconstruction surgery. In my car as the engine started, the car radio played the song “Sexual Healing.” The first full verse I heard was, “You’re my medicine, come on and let me in. I can’t wait for you to operate.” It was the sign I needed, rational or not!

  As I showered the morning of my surgery, I rubbed the bar of soap across my chest for the last time. I had always said when I looked down in the shower, I didn’t see my breasts were gone—I saw the cancer was gone. I realized that soon I would be seeing two healthy, surgically created breasts that would be cancer-free and remain that way for life, hopefully. Surgery was performed in December 2002. Once asleep, I knew my hospital gown would be lifted up to my neck, exposing my body. I prepared typed signs to wear, whic
h were taped to my chest and abdomen—some comic relief for the OR staff. Over my right mastectomy incision, it said: “Please super-size me.” Over my left mastectomy incision, it said: “I’m here for a front-end realignment.” And over my navel, it said: “Dear Santa, thanks for bringing me cleavage for Christmas.” The signage brought a laugh to the OR team, as intended. I also realized this would be yet another form of transformation surgery.

  The day my drains came out and I was able to get in the shower without tubes and devices in my way, I took a bar of soap and slowly washed my new breasts with tears streaming down my face. It was a profound moment. The “girls” and I were home and doing fine (and they were each capable of holding a bar of soap under their mammary fold).

  At five weeks post-op, my husband and I quickly turned into a pair of honeymooners, test-driving my new body often. He told his brother, “I feel like I’m sleeping with another woman and have my wife’s permission.”

  Our daughter took me bra shopping—an event that should have been videotaped: three hours of laughter and twice a few tears. She went through the department-store bras and proceeded to show me what a bra can do for a woman’s breasts today: lift them up, push them together, pull them apart, add a cup size and deepen cleavage. You name it, and there’s a bra that can do it. Now I’d be wearing bras that had names, color and designer configurations that really should come with an operator’s manual.

  I still smile with joy in the shower every morning when the girls and I get wet and soapy. And perhaps I’m even more pleased than most women would be because I have mourned the loss of my breasts, was resolved I would never have them again and was given the gift of choice at long last—to choose or not to choose reconstruction. Was it worth the wait? You betcha!

  What did I do with Betty Boob and Bobbie Sue, my breast prostheses? I wanted to select someone very special to receive them. They are happily resting on the chest of an underserved woman whom I have had the privilege to take care of at the Johns Hopkins Breast Center. Once fitted in my mastectomy bras, with Betty Boob and Bobbie Sue tucked inside, she hugged me tight for giving her this special gift of an important piece of me from an important time in my life: my bosom buddies. I realized at that moment, as we were embracing, that my new breasts were actually hugging my old prosthetic breasts. It was as if my old girls perhaps were saying, “Welcome to Lillie’s. We know you will enjoy your stay. We did. She’s full of life and love and energy like no one else we know. You will meet many newly diagnosed women with breast cancer just as we have over the last decade. She will utilize you as she did us—giving women hope and reminding them this is a disease that is emotionally charged and tests our psyches. We’ll come by to visit periodically with our new owner. Again, welcome.”

  Lillie Shockney, R.N., B.S., M.A.S.

  The Graduation

  I personally measure success in terms of the contribution an individual makes to her or his fellow human beings.

  Margaret Mead

  I patiently waited for the phone to ring. It was 5:10 on Friday afternoon, December twenty-ninth, and I still hadn’t heard from Mom. This was the big day . . . day thirty-five . . . the final radiation treatment for her breast cancer. I knew she would have had her last radiation jolt at 3:30 P.M., her daily treatment time since the middle of November.

  Yesterday, our whole family met to have lunch and see a movie to celebrate the end of her treatments. During lunch, family members kept making kidding comments. “Raise your hand if you used Mom’s cancer as an excuse to get out of something these past few months.” More than half of us raised our hands.

  “Be nice!” Mom joked. “I’ve got cancer!”

  “It’s gone now, Mom,” we chimed in.

  At the end of our special day, we gathered around her car. It had taken us twenty minutes in the underground parking cavern to find the lavender pole marked C7 where she thought she was parked. My mother always gets lost in parking structures.

  As I helped her into the car, I handed her a tiny gold-wrapped package. “Here, Mom, this is for you,” I said. My emotions cut loose and embarrassed me as the tears poured down my cheeks.

  “You’re crying, Heather,” Mom said in a soft, motherly tone.

  “Shhh,” I said, turning around to see if anyone in the family was watching, and I caught my sister’s eye. She knew I’d hidden the little “graduation gift” in my purse all afternoon. I was waiting for the right time to give it to her. “It’s all right,” my sister mouthed to me.

  I turned back to Mom. “Please don’t open this gift until tomorrow, AFTER your last radiation.”

  On the way home, I told my children why I got so emotional when I gave Nana her gift. It was not out of sadness, but my reaction to Mom’s incredible humor and positive outlook during her entire experience with what she calls the “Big C.” She never felt sorry for herself, never blamed anyone and never complained . . . ever.

  Throughout her ordeal, she brought her unique sparkle into the lives of other cancer patients and the hospital staff. Daily, she’d call and tell me about the people she had seen at the center. There was a seventy-ish wealthy attorney battling prostate cancer, married to a twenty-something woman; he always sits next to Mom in the treatment waiting area. His doting wife is attentive, but clearly has a lot on her hands with him. One day, he poked his head out of the dressing-room door before he changed into his hospital gown. He asked my mother to join him after he closed the door so that they “could fool around.” The other patients roared with laughter. I’m not so sure the wife did.

  And then there was the thirty-one-year-old, grossly overweight man with a large brain tumor. His father brought him to the center every day for his radiation. Mom’s new friend chose to wait in the hallway outside the designated waiting room; she thinks it’s because he’s self-conscious about his appearance. “It’s not just the weight,” she told me. “His facial features are slightly askew, too.” When she passed him in the hall, she always touched him and asked how he was doing. The other day, the man’s father told Mom that her touch each day gives his son hope. “No one but you ever touches him,” he said.

  By the end of the first week of her radiation, Mom knew the name, age and astrological sign of the entire radiation staff. Just before the holidays, she brought See’s candy for everyone and sent two large flower arrangements to the nurses at her surgeon’s office.

  During the last two weeks of her treatment, Mom got a double dose of radiation each day. I could tell she was very tired and that her skin itched terribly . . . still, no complaints.

  When she was switched to the double dose, she saw the technician use a small metal piece marked “M. MacDougall,” and asked if she could keep it as a souvenir. That’s when I got the idea for her gift. I bought a gold calendar pendant that I had engraved “December” with the twenty-ninth crossed off. I chose a twenty-inch gold chain so the pendant would rest on her chest.

  At 5:20 P.M., just as the sun was setting over the Santa Barbara mountains, the phone rang.

  “Guess what!” Mom shouted on the other end. “I got a diploma! My first real diploma! It says: ‘Successfully completed radiation treatment at Cedars Sinai Cancer Center,’ and I never even graduated from college!”

  “Mom, you’re amazing!” I said, smiling into the phone.

  Heather Haldeman

  Chockwut Pudding

  All the animals, excepting man, know that the principal business of life is to enjoy it.

  Samuel Butler

  I had always respected rules, did all my homework and cleaned my plate before I could have dessert. An evening with my nieces Kristi and Kelli changed all that.

  The girls wanted to play “waitress” and asked me to join them. Kristi (age three) and I were seated on the couch, ready to watch “the show,” and Kelli (age five) was our hostess and waitress.

  “Good evening,” Kelli smiled at me. “Welcome to our show. Are you ready to order?”

  “Yes. I’ll have popcorn with the sho
w,” I answered.

  “I’m sorry, there is no popcorn. This is a dinner show. We are serving dinner.”

  “Oh, okay.” I hastily adjusted my order. “I’ll have a turkey sandwich.”

  “Very good,” Kelli nodded briskly. Then she turned, peering over her imaginary order pad, to her next patron.

  “What would you like to order for dinner with your show?” asked Kelli.

  “Chockwut pudding,” smiled Kristi.

  “I’m sorry,” answered the waitress. “This is a dinner show. We are serving dinner. You have to order dinner. Do you understand?”

  Kristi nodded solemnly.

  “Okay, good. So what would you like to order?” Kelli asked crisply.

  “Chockwut pudding,” said Kristi.

  “No, Kristi! I told you—this is dinnertime. Only dinner is being ordered now. Afterwards, maybe you can have dessert, but this is just for dinner. So what do you want to order for dinner?”

  “Chockwut pudding!” Kristi stated with conviction.

  “You can’t have chocolate pudding. You have to order dinner. What will you have?”

  “Chockwut pudding.” Kristi spoke slowly and patiently, as if speaking to someone from another planet.

  “Oh. All right.” Kelli, the perfect waitress, stomped off to serve dinner (and chocolate pudding) and start the show.

  This little scenario between two adorable little girls changed the way I think about a lot of things. Why do you have to eat a big dinner to have dessert? And what if dessert is all you reallywant? Why is it that people who really know what they want always seem to get it? Look at how persistence really pays off if you stick to your guns. Why do we give away our power to those feeding us? And why can’t we have chocolate pudding whenever we want it?

  So now I think of “chockwut pudding” whenever something seems to be standing in my way—and I breeze right past the obstacles . . . like cancer. I think “chockwut pudding” whenever anyone implies that my goal can’t be achieved, my dream can’t come true, or that cancer can’t be defeated. All the research, the medical technology, chemotherapy and radiation are there to keep my dreams alive . . . and they’re working.