One month ago, a friend of mine decided to stop her chemo treatments because they were not helping her and only making her feel sicker. It was becoming apparent that her time was coming and she opted to stop the treatment and retire to her home to meet her final days. Last night, at 6:30 Alaska time, she quietly passed away. She died in her sleep; she merely stopped breathing and at her request, her nurse and her husband did not revive her. She had been a robust woman with a bosom that many of us would have paid amazing money for, with skills in education, psychology, sewing, and overall wisdom that enlightened me for years. She had a nasty sense of humor and while she tolerated my more uncultured approaches to life, she herself could periodically bring herself into the trenches and play the bad girl as well as the rest of us.
Her husband had been one of my best male friends for years. We were comrades in arms through a number of trials and tribulations on the D & D table, and many a late night we stayed up watching movies or playing MtG. It was because of him that I met my current husband, and it was because of me, that he met my friend who became his wife. I was thrilled when they married; they were both able to give each other what each one one of them so needed and desired.
In August of this year, they celebrated their 18th wedding anniversary. Two individuals, deeply involved in the SCA, fantasy role-playing games, sewing and brewing, and exemplified what a relationship should be: compromise, friendship, love, fun. The husband and I would drink microbrewed beers while she and others discussed crafts; she and I would create in the kitchen shouting out our moves while the battles with orcs wore on late into the night. Nothing like doing quick deep fries while running into the dining room to toss a 20-sided die, call our move and then run back into the kitchen in order to avoiding burning our creations.
Ordering pizza would have been so much easier but far less fun.
So, you ask, why I am posting this in rants?
I am tired of my friends suffering or dying from preventable cancers.
I get a mammogram every year. This year, I have been once again told that I have a benign tumor in a duct that will have to be removed because "they think it is benign" but why risk it. My mother has already lost a breast due to cancer and I never had children- both of which places me at higher risk. So, back to the operating table I go.
My friend's death could have been prevented if she had just gotten yearly mammograms, but instead, she never saw the need.
Another friend just had a double masectomy.
And another just finished chemo of 3 months, 3 times a week in order to stop cancer.
And last year, I lost two people I knew well to breast cancer.
An amazing woman has passed away because she was too busy to get a mammogram. I will be writing this weekend to contribute to her euology and finding several other friends to pass on the news or comfort ourselves at the loss of a great friend. I hate writing eulogies. I have written three in the last two years. When I said I wanted to become a writer, it was not to do this, but rather to write about life- not about the passing of such. But then, we all follow where destiny takes us.
To the women of this board: get a mammogram yearly, particularly if you are 35 or older. Often, your local or state government will offer them for free if your insurance does not cover them- and there are many clinics which do so as well. Breast cancer can be prevented as it can be caught early if you have an established baseline of normal x-rays; yes, it takes the call, the appointment and 30 minutes of your time, but it can save your life.
Do it.
The world has just lost an amazingly wonderful woman, leaving one of my best friends without a spouse.
Don't let it happen to you and your loved ones.
Muerta
