Tuesday, January 30, 2007

I should really find a good novel or something.

I've been reading the archived messages from my metastatic breast cancer group. It was started in 1999, and the founders are all dead. They were articulate, compassionate women -- brave and terrified, just like you'd expect. It was a group created only for women with metastatic disease. There was some bickering about that -- women with early stage breast cancer felt left out.

Inside the mets group the women made not-so-funny jokes about the irony of being envied for their stage IV status.

There were a few women in particular who touched me. I read all of their posts... followed their stories... read about their deaths.

I read letter after letter from these women. They were so smart and so kind. Some of them were realistic and hospice-oriented, and others just fought & fought & fought and never gave up "hope". All of them died. Cancer cells don't care what we've vowed.

In a few years there will be women who search the archives and find the letters I've written. Maybe one of them will follow my story.

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