1) Observations of A Breast Cancer Husband
I wanted to us a blog title that was simple and would pop up on a normal GOOGLE search, but “Breast Cancer Husband” was already taken (http://www.breastcancerhusband.com/). So was “Stand By Her” (http://standbyher.org/). I went to those sites, but one has been corrupted by endless spam and the other has been inactive for nearly a year. Another I tried seems full of advertising and another still was a long advertisement for an exercise program developed by a breast cancer husbands’ wife.
So here I am, because I need someone to talk to RIGHT NOW and I want to talk to other husbands, fiancés, and lovers of women with breast cancer.
Our journey is only two weeks old. While my wife Liz knew something was seriously wrong inside of her body, I was clueless. Until two weeks ago, a biopsy at the Breast Care Center at Regions Hospital in Minnesota ( ) confirmed that she had infiltrative ductal carcinoma. It was the most common form of breast cancer. Treatments had been worked out. Research had been done. It is survivable…
A week later, Liz had a bilateral mastectomy.
I’m writing this six days after the surgery.
I’ve searched the internet and I haven’t been able to find an active husband-whose-wife-has-breast-cancer blog that I could chat on. Maybe it’s because their wives have been survivors for years and they can relax, or they can take a step back, or they’re exhausted, or the danger is no longer clear and present.
Not so for me. Based on everything I’ve read so far, this job is only just beginning.
Ah, the name of the blog: I couldn’t call it Breast Cancer Husband, so I went to the thesaurus to look for synonyms and the etymological dictionary for word roots. It all comes down to a “husband” having something to do with farming. Words like cultivate, garden, graze, grow, harvest, landscape, seed, sow, tend and till the soil are all related to “husband”. The word “reap” was in there, too.
At first that didn’t do anything for me, but when I came across “reap”, of course the first thing I thought of was the Grim Reaper. Then my mind went to work, the Reaper’s robe turned pink and I had the image in my head of the Breast Cancer Reaper: cutting down breast cancer, growing hope, harvesting love, creating a new landscape (in more ways than one!), cultivating peace, sowing joy, tending the field, the Garden of Eden, good and healthy eating…
At any rate, this will be a personal blog with medical LINKS – I’m no doctor, though I have been a science teacher for three decades. This blog may wax and wane humorous as well. Humor is how I deal with grief and tragedy (actually, humor is how I deal with just about everything and everyone…)
We’ll see. All I know right now is that my wife has breast cancer, she, my daughter (whose blog links are below), my son & daughter-in-law & grandson and the rest of both of our families and friends, are dealing with this in different ways.
I should be here once a week, probably Saturdays, and my goal will be to provide something that’s short, personal and helpful.
That is all…
Heart disease, cancer, and Alzheimer’s STILL claim way too many lives.
However, the ripples in the time line since that diagnosis are still active; not as huge, certainly, but they are still there. Lifestyle changes – for me for the worse (I spent too much of the past ten years eating too much…), some for the better – like we’ve both retired. As well, since that time, we’ve met MANY people whose lives withered under the impact of breast cancer. Many, many recovered, thank God and the doctors He’s had working on the breast cancer front (and the Alzheimer’s front!).
I’ll keep blogging, especially about medical development of tools to fight against both diseases. So, keep reading and if you have questions or need a virtual shoulder to cry on, let me know.
Resource: https://www.healthsystemtracker.org/brief/covid-19-is-the-number-one-cause-of-death-in-the-u-s-in-early-2021/, https://img.datawrapper.de/jw0qD/full.png
A week later, Liz had a bilateral mastectomy.
I’m writing this six days after the surgery.
I’ve searched the internet and I haven’t been able to find an active husband-whose-wife-has-breast-cancer blog that I could chat on. Maybe it’s because their wives have been survivors for years and they can relax, or they can take a step back, or they’re exhausted, or the danger is no longer clear and present.
Not so for me. Based on everything I’ve read so far, this job is only just beginning.
Ah, the name of the blog: I couldn’t call it Breast Cancer Husband, so I went to the thesaurus to look for synonyms and the etymological dictionary for word roots. It all comes down to a “husband” having something to do with farming. Words like cultivate, garden, graze, grow, harvest, landscape, seed, sow, tend and till the soil are all related to “husband”. The word “reap” was in there, too.
At first that didn’t do anything for me, but when I came across “reap”, of course the first thing I thought of was the Grim Reaper. Then my mind went to work, the Reaper’s robe turned pink and I had the image in my head of the Breast Cancer Reaper: cutting down breast cancer, growing hope, harvesting love, creating a new landscape (in more ways than one!), cultivating peace, sowing joy, tending the field, the Garden of Eden, good and healthy eating…
At any rate, this will be a personal blog with medical LINKS – I’m no doctor, though I have been a science teacher for three decades. This blog may wax and wane humorous as well. Humor is how I deal with grief and tragedy (actually, humor is how I deal with just about everything and everyone…)
We’ll see. All I know right now is that my wife has breast cancer, she, my daughter (whose blog links are below), my son & daughter-in-law & grandson and the rest of both of our families and friends, are dealing with this in different ways.
I should be here once a week, probably Saturdays, and my goal will be to provide something that’s short, personal and helpful.
That is all…
But, that was NOT all.
A decade later, everything still remains…not the same. We have three grandchildren now; the kids have been married for some time. Our foster daughter is getting married this summer. We had the COVID19 Pandemic with nearly three million dead from it (by comparison the chart below shows the daily number of deaths from COVID as compared to the daily number of deaths from other causes. I repeatedly ran across COVID19 deaths referred to as “excess deaths”. Apparently the census takers count on a certain number of people dying every day…:Heart disease, cancer, and Alzheimer’s STILL claim way too many lives.
At any rate, all that to say that things have changed since my wife’s cancer diagnosis a decade ago. There are moments I’ll never forget. There are moments I’d LIKE to forget. There are events I can’t recall at all.
However, the ripples in the time line since that diagnosis are still active; not as huge, certainly, but they are still there. Lifestyle changes – for me for the worse (I spent too much of the past ten years eating too much…), some for the better – like we’ve both retired. As well, since that time, we’ve met MANY people whose lives withered under the impact of breast cancer. Many, many recovered, thank God and the doctors He’s had working on the breast cancer front (and the Alzheimer’s front!).
I’ll keep blogging, especially about medical development of tools to fight against both diseases. So, keep reading and if you have questions or need a virtual shoulder to cry on, let me know.
Resource: https://www.healthsystemtracker.org/brief/covid-19-is-the-number-one-cause-of-death-in-the-u-s-in-early-2021/, https://img.datawrapper.de/jw0qD/full.png
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