I found a lump in my breast in February of 2004. I lay in my bed, cuddled up with my hound, listening to the rain drum on the farm house roof. I noted that it was there, and as is my habit, I instituted the "three week rule." The "three week rule" had been cooked up my first year in college to deal with my growing hypochondria that was fed by an insatiable need to look up symptoms on Web M.D.
The rule is quite simple. Unless I am bleeding, fainting or in other way need immediate medical attention, I wait three weeks. If whatever I am worried about is gone, I've most likely forgotten that I instituted the three week rule. If it's still there, I call the doctor. I use the three week rule a lot. A two-cancers survivor, it's easy for twinges and twangs to turn into metastases in my head. The three work rule saves me a good bit of worry.
When the three weeks elapsed, I was left with a bump protruding from my right breast and a thought nagging me to go in. College is college. I worked part time, went to school full time, and I had been, with a partner, nominated to travel to present our project at a conference in Florida. Three weeks turned into a month. A month turned into two.
When I finally managed to get myself to the health clinic, at my sweetheart's urging, it didn't take long for the nurse to decide I needed referred for more testing. This was done hesitantly with discussion with a doctor and after I had told her of the "three week rule."
After leaving the clinic, I sat in the spring-filled courtyard, and I watched the campus children's center send bubbles flying in mass up into the clear blue sky. In a moment of clarity, I realized they were looking for cancer. The one time I hadn't let my hypochondria get the best of me, they were worried about cancer. Tears started building at the back of my eyes, my breath stilled, and my throat ached. All I could think about was bubbles and children and children and bubbles.
One of my professors found me, sitting outside, staring at sky, not crying. I don't remember telling her what was happening, but I do remember saying "they're looking for cancer." I do remember her telling me she had breast cancer. I remember her telling me that waiting was the hardest part. At some point, the tears that had been growing spilled out of me, the opposite of bubbles: weighted liquid streamed down my chest. Gravity pulled my sorrow out of me.
My professor held me. She might have been 100 pounds dripping wet. She might have been 5 inches shorter than me, if I was being generous. She didn't try to tell me it would be alright. She didn't try to make it better. She just held me and gave me a space to be with my grief. After awhile, she looked at me and told me a story.
When she was diagnosed, she was diagnosed with stage IV disease, her child was young, and the doctor's weren't expecting her to live long. I think they had given her a month. One day she was shopping somewhere; I can't remember if it was the mall or downtown, but it's not really important. She saw $100 pair of shoes that she wanted. They were cute. She needed shoes. Hers were worn out. She looked at the shoes and thought, "I really don't need those shoes. I'm not going to be here long enough to enjoy them." She looked at the shoes again, and then said out loud to herself, "E, just buy the DAMN shoes."
She looked at me and said, "sometimes, you do things, because you need to." I wasn't really sure what she meant by that. I'm still not. This story has meant different things to me over the years. When I found out she had died, I took comfort in this story, because it was something she had given me that I had kept close. When I was diagnosed the second time, it kept me from turning into a hermit and only spending money on medical bills, and now, it means something different.
Each time, I remember it, I remember her. Each time I remember it, I need a different part of the story. Sometimes, I do things, because I need to. Sometimes, I do things, because I want to, and sometimes, I need to give my grief space to spill out of me so that I can move on and have laughter spring from me, bubbles floating up and away on a cool spring afternoon.
