numb

The friend I've known for ever was diagnosed with breast cancer yesterday. She'd been complaining of a sore shoulder and chest, and that's how the doctor found the lump. A needle biospy was done and the report came back featuring the word 'malignant'. Her doctor though, said the lump didn't look cancerous. In fact, apart from that surprising result, there was nothing at all about that lump that even hinted that it was anything more than your standard, every day fibroadenoma. So the lump was removed this Monday just gone, and the surgeon took a little more tissue from around it so that if it was cancer, there'd be no need to go back in to remove any more.

The doctor was right too, the lump wasn't cancerous. Her entire breast, on the other hand, was.

They're taking it off on Monday, but that's okay, she said. Her doctor said he'd build her a new one. "And", she also said, "he's going to use my tummy fat to do it so two birds, one stone, yannow?".

She's always so friggin' brave that for her, it isn't even being brave, it's just her being her.

Between now and next week she'll be undergoing a barrage of tests. Bone scans, blood draws, chest x-rays...this is a woman who has gone through so much already.

She lost a daughter three years ago, one of twins, at only six months of age, and my friend had to endure that while loving and living for her other children. The remaining twin has the same rare blood disorder that took her sister, so even a small sniffle is enough to knock her for six and scare the shit out of the rest of the family. Now there's another baby girl in the picture too. She's just turned one so my friend should be enjoying her family without worrying about how much longer she's got left with them.

It wasn't fair when she lost her daughter, it wasn't fair that her other daughter is so chronically ill, so it sure as hell isn't fair that she has to go through this too, this cancer bullshit. It simply isn't fair.