I was holding my 12-month-old granddaughter in my arms when the phone
rang. With little Theona balanced on my hip, I picked up the receiver.
“This is Dr. Carr. I am calling you about your pathology.”
My new doctor’s voice rang in my ear. I walked into the living
room and found a seat with amazing calm. “This was not the news
I want or expected.” My mind said silently, while wordlessly
translating the word,” Pathology” more accurately into
‘Cancer.”
A week earlier, when my doctor had strongly suggested that I have
a biopsy. I had felt that she was ‘over reacting.’ Yes,
the mammogram results showed some change since the mammogram I had
in 1996. What hadn't changed since 1996? The ultrasound had
showed nothing. The thermogram, an ‘alternative’ diagnostic
method I had opted for, rather than biopsy, “did not rule out
pathology,’ but it indicated no neovascularity (the usual sign
of cancer) and attributed the mild asymmetry in my breasts to the
likelihood of fibrocystic activity.
I remember Dr. Carr’s firm voice saying, “ The thermogram
did not rule out pathology. Only a biopsy can do that. I strongly
advise that you schedule one.” My response was, “No, I
don’t think so.” Whatever was showing up on the mammogram
did not show up on the ultrasound so a biopsy would have to be done
while my breast was in a mammogram machine. I was not feeling inclined
to have my breast punctured with a needle while being squished in
a mammogram machine, with so little evidence of anything amiss. I
felt it was important to be respectful of my body, and having a biopsy
didn't’t seem respectful.
On the afternoon of the day I said no to the biopsy, I was driving
Theona home after her regular afternoon at my house, listening to
All things Considered on the car radio. Within the fifteen minutes,
they aired two different stories on cancer. I have listened to All
Things Considered for years. I never before heard that much back-to-back
focus on cancer. I felt the Universe put an exclamation points after
my doctor’s statement, “Schedule a biopsy!!” The
next morning I made the call for the biopsy appointment.
I was slightly awed by my doctor’s directness as she told me
the results,
“The biopsy is positive. You have a lump. It has to come out!”
She continued describing the diagnosis, as my mind was still in a
effort to take in the meaning, adjusting to this reality.
“I am so glad, you had that biopsy and didn't wait for
another thermogram in three months. Catching it early is so important.”
She continued. I could feel her reaching out to me, hoping that I
would not prove to be an ongoing obstinate patient.
I responded,
“Thank you so much for being ‘on my case’ to have
it. It turned out to be a very positive experience. I felt so held
and nurtured by the women who did it. They were so loving, so respectful,
so communicative about everything that they were doing and so careful
to make it as pain free and comfortable an experience as possible.
They even gave me a flower afterwards. Thank you so much for that
referral.
My mind went back to the amazement I had felt at the time, surrounded
by three loving, highly skilled, compassionate women, working as a
respectful team with each other and with me, attentive to both the
technical exactness of their job and expressive of love and connection
as human beings together in the situation. They held my hand, asked
me sincerely how I was feeling at each step in the procedure. They
offered choices and explanations at every interval. I had left the
experience feeling loved, protected and empowered.
“Oh, I am so glad!” I could hear the relief in Dr. Carr’s
voice. She continued to tell me the next steps, referring me to a
surgeon of whom she expressed enthusiastic confidence.
In the weeks that followed my diagnosis, the same loving care I had
received during my biopsy I experienced during each step of my treatment.
The teamwork, the mutual respect between all the doctors, nurses,
technicians and myself as patient. My surgeon and radiologist included
my husband and all of my family with enthusiasm in every aspect of
my treatment except the actual surgery and radiation therapy for obvious
safety reasons.
Many Mainers, now refer to the day I had my lumpectomy surgery, April
16th, as the Patriot’s Day Storm. I arrived at Mid Coast Hospital
at 9:15 for registration and various pre-opt consultations. My surgery
was scheduled for 1:00 pm. Spending the morning in pre-op, I was unaware
that the weather outside was turning into a major cataclysmic storm.
Just before being taken into the operating room, my surgeon stopped
by to see me. She had just arrived and was amazingly up beat as she
shared that she had lost the roof of her home that morning. On her
way to Mid Coast Hospital to perform my surgery, she was one of the
last cars to make it through on Route 295 before the interstate was closed
due to the storm and flooding. She shared this news in a warm, mutual
manner and an attitude of acceptance.
After the surgery, as I came out of the anesthesia, she checked in
again with me. She was excited for me that the biopsy on the sentinel
node was negative, indicating that the cancer had not spread into
the lymph system. As we had discussed, she had place a spacer balloon
at the sight of the removed microscopic lump, since I was a good candidate
for a new radiation procedure, using a mammosite balloon to administer
local radiation to the breast. After telling me the ‘Good News”
she added confidently, I’m off to find my kids and my husband.
When I expressed sympathy for the loss of her roof and obvious extensive
damage to her home, she said in a light tone of equanimity, ‘Well,
what can you do?”
Later in that week during which thousands of Mainers, including us
were without power for days, we met in her office in Portland to determine
if the placement of the spacer balloon was deep enough to proceed
with the actual mammosite and local radiation.
Here again I witnessed teamwork of mutual respect, clear sensitive
communication and a high degree of skill among the nurses, technicians
and my surgeon as they measured to determine if the actual mammosite
was a go. The ultra sound technician skillfully directed the surgeon
as she inserted the final mammosite in place inside my breast with
the care and precision of a talented artist. The level of skill and
service was particularly impressive, since some of these staff were
still without power, water and heat in their homes, yet here they
were giving their best for my benefit.
The following week I began the five days of radiation. Again I found
myself amidst a highly skilled, deeply caring, team of technicians,
nurses, physicists and doctors.
Twice a day, once in the morning and again 6 hours later, they measured
carefully to assure that the mammosite balloon had not moved. Then
I lay down in comfort in an underground chamber, not unlike a large
sweat lodge, deep in Mother Earth. As I listened to Carlos Nakai native
flute music, the technician and physicist ‘closed the flap’
of the chamber and carefully with the use of a computer robot, inserted
the exact amount of the Sun’s radiant energy into the mammosite
for the exact amount of time for the purification of my breast. It
was so like a sweat lodge within a sweat lodge. I felt held in healing
of the Grandmother Earth and Grandfather Sun’s Energy, and the
compassionate deep heartedness of the whole radiation team.
All my life I have thought of myself as an alternative person. I have
often felt that allopathic medicine is intrusive and non-holistic,
disrespecting of the body’s innate wisdom and ability to heal.
This experience has opened me to a larger view. Certainly we each
have a responsibility to listen to our bodies, and treat them with
the respect that supports their healthy function. There are many alternative-healing
modalities that can help us to do that.
Despite my inclination toward alternative and holistic healing modalities,
I owe a tremendous debt- a life saving debt to allopathic medicine.
Everyone in my family would not be alive and well today without the
interventions of Allopathic medicine. I would have died at age seven
from peritonitis. My oldest son, Tully, would not have survived his
premature birth two months early. My youngest son would not have survived
inhaling a peanut skin into his lungs when he was 16 months old. My
husband Peter would not have survived peritonitis in his twenties.
My experience this spring and summer has again increased my debt to
the practice of allopathic medicine. It has been inspiring to witness
the compassion, mutual respect and teamwork of the highly skilled
medical practitioners who took such good care of me. I know I have
been exceptionally blessed, at each step in my experience with cancer.
Despite my disregard for annual mammograms, the cancer was caught
very early, was very treatable, and I have an excellent prognosis.
Statistically my chances of the cancer reoccurring are less than 4%
if I take my little hormone therapy pin daily for the next five years.
I have deep gratitude to all those whose harrowing experiences laid
the foundation for my positive experience, both the patients, who
the medical practitioners learned from, and the dedication of the
doctors, nurses and technicians who have continued to improve the
quality of treatment in all ways. Cancer is no longer always the inevitable
death sentence it once was. Certainly for many, if not most, it is
still more challenging than what I was fortunate enough to experience.
Yet my experience has put me in touch with how much progress has been
made towards treating this disease that claimed the lives of both
my parents and my brother, Ben.
By June I felt very much in my stride, even outside using my trusty
little chainsaw daily to bring more breath to the land here and balance
back to the flora by pruning the invasive species.
In the early evening of June 4th, I began to have a mild discomfort
in my abdomen. I am not one to have digestive distress, so I thought
perhaps I was coming down with ‘a bug.’ I took my regular
preventive remedies to no avail, the pain gradually but steady increased.
After a couple of hours I called my doctor and got the doctor on call
who advised me that if the pain persisted I should go to the ER. After
another half hour I realized I needed to definitely seek relief. When
I got to the ER, they asked, “On a scale from one to ten, ten
being the worst and one the least, how would you rate your level of
pain?” The answer was a clear, “TEN!” The worst
pain of my life! They administered morphine. It didn’t seem
to ‘touch’ it. They prepped me for a CT Scan. Finally
the after a couple of hours and a shift to vicodin, the pain became
more bearable. They sent the CT Scan results off to Australia, where
someone was awake to interpret them.
When the ER doc reported the findings to me, this is what I understood,
“You have a ‘mass’ in your liver, another ‘mass’
in your colon, another ‘mass’ somewhere else (I’ve
forgotten where) and something questionable going on in your ovaries
and uterus.”
My unvoiced inner response was, “Is that all!?!? How amazing
is it that I am still alive and until this sudden awful pain, fully
functional?” Then he said, “You should see this gynecologist
in the morning”, handing me a card with a doctors name and phone
number. “If you think you can manage the pain with oral pain
killers, you can go home, if you want to.”
I was very relieved to go home and with more vicodin, I was able to
sleep.
In the morning I encountered the human side of the medical establishment:
The gynecologist number they had given me was no longer in service;
when I did reach the office they were referring me too, I was told
they could not see me with a diagnosis of
‘Abdominal pain’ without a referral from my own doctor.
I was relieved to be referred back to her. When I saw her, she reinterpreted
the CT results and told me that the masses in my liver, colon, and
else where were all normal for my age and not indicative of pathology.
She did agree that I should see a gynecological surgeon. She said
with seeming delight, “All things happen for a reason.”
When she discovered that the gynecologist, that the ER referred me
to, was on vacation and could not see me. Dr. Carr then referred me
to her preferred gynecologist. My daughter-in-law, who is a nurse
in birthing center at the hospital, later confirmed that Dr. Carr
referred me to the best gynecologist in the area. Dr. Carr got me
appointments with the gynecologist and with the ultrasound and other
tests the gynecologist requested all within two days.
When I saw the gynecologist she told me that the tests did not necessarily
indicate cancer, but did indicate enlarged ovaries and the need for
their removal. She said she would be fine with referring me to an
oncology (cancer) surgeon in Portland, if I wished. Clearly she did
not feel that cancer had been ‘ruled out.’ I said no,
I wanted her to do it here at Mid Coast, close to home. She agreed
and said that from what was indicated it would be a day surgery called
a laprosopy, which entailed three small slits, though with the surgery
was done with fiber optics. She said the recovery time would be a
couple of weeks.
She also indicated that once she was able to see inside my pelvic
cavity, it was possible that she might find that something more extensive
might be called for. If that was the case, major surgery might be
called for and that would entail a recovery time of 6 weeks.
I felt confidence in her, particularly after talking with my daughter-in-law
and getting a sense of how highly respected she was. Once I was home,
it occurred to me, what if she finds that more extensive surgery is
called for? Is she going to wake me up to discuss it? I was clear
I didn’t want her to do that; I wanted her to proceed according
to her best professional judgment. I made another pre-surgery appointment
to clarify this between us. She said if more needed to be done, she
would proceed, unless what she found was cancer. If that was the case,
she said would not proceed since it was not her area of expertise.
She was willing to do whatever was within her gynecological expertise.
After the surgery we were both very grateful for that conversation.
What she saw through the fiber optic camera was a melon-sized cist
on my left ovary, that had twisted on itself and was hemorrhaging
and dying. It was too big to be reabsorbed the body or removed without
major surgery. Without surgical intervention it would have caused
my death. In addition there was also another melon sized fibroid cist
on my uterus. Thankfully, she proceeded with a full hysterectomy.
One of the many amazing things about this unexpected major surgery
is that Spirit had arranged my whole schedule to accommodate the six
weeks of recovery. I was totally about to see two or three clients
a day, while still taking naps, getting acupuncture and raindrop technique
essential oil treatments, spending time with my son on the water and
mini beaches of the Mid Coast area. I had a clear six weeks until
I needed to facilitate a spiritual retreat in Iowa, be on staff at
Kindred Spirits Camp in Rowe, hold people on vision quest, etc.
This is just one of the details of this experience that has affirmed
for me the amazing responsiveness of Life. I am so grateful for the
Unity and complete interconnectedness of all of life. I am now aware
this Unity of Life is not a concept, rather it is a day-to-day experience.
We are all connected with everything and everything is completely
responsive to the perception we choose to have of what is happening.
This doesn’t mean that stuff (you might read ‘shit’
here) doesn’t happen. It does! But while it is happening, it
is constantly responding to our way of perceiving it, our way of framing
it.
I feel so fortunate that I have gained the inner discipline and presence
to come through these medical experiences with a high degree of inner
peace, ease and confidence in Life and Spirit. For the most part I
did not find a problem, just things happening in my life.
More and more I find I can trust whatever is happening in life. I
am so grateful for the gift of this understanding. Repeatedly during
my treatment for cancer and the hysterectomy, I heard my caregivers
say, “There was something different about you.” “You
are so calm” “You’re fun.” I am so grateful
for the skill of presence that has developed over years of spiritual
practice and inner inquiry into false agreements. The prayers of so
many supported this discipline, together contributing to a blessed
reality. I feel incredibly blessed to experience inner peace synchronize
with such a positive outcome.
It is now exactly nine weeks since the hysterectomy, and I feel much
more energy than and vibrant health than I did a year ago. Life is
such a radiant miracle. (Except when it isn’t, of course, and
even that is ‘right on.’)
