Under wraps

Dear readers, it’s fair to say blog posts have been hard to come by lately for me. What with the unexpected death of my dear friend Rach in February I find myself immersed in grief and selfishly only doing things for myself. Gardening and creativity.

But, some days, for all your experience, all your wisdom, and for all your just knowing things the way only women do, you walk into a situation where you cannot be other than belittled and patronised. Just like I did last week. I  wished and wished I could have shared this experience with Rach, I can just imagine her response. And, equally, I can also hear her saying, ‘You have to blog about this Sarah, you just have to!’ I know she would say that.

Here’s what happened.

The other week I received a phone message out of the blue from a film producer who’s making a documentary about ‘the dangers of breast screening’ – his words. He’s someone who I know in Liverpool and very occasionally, like every few years, will bump into him, but we’re only on that level of knowing each other. I’m intrigued by his message

So not right

February 2012. Flying to New Jersey to say goodbye to Rach.

On the way home from New Jersey I find myself in a window seat next to two British women on the plane. They were sitting in front of me on the way over and I remember them, they are happy, laughing, enjoying themselves. The inevitable ‘what did you do?’ conversation ensues. They’ve done ‘everything’ in New York, having travelled over to see Barry Manilow in concert (does he still play I wonder to myself, although the women tell me he wasn’t well and the concert was cancelled.) So when it’s my turn I just say I went to a funeral. ‘Oh,’ they say. ‘My friend died,’ I say. ‘Of breast cancer,’ I say. They look at me. ‘How old was she?’ they ask. ‘Forty-one,’ I say. ‘Oh,’ they say. ‘It fucking pisses me off good style,’ I say. I don’t mean to swear but I’m so angry. And all this last week I’ve been having very short conversations which punctuate very long silences which consist of few words, ‘This fucking sucks.’ Because it does.

I look out the window. The runway, we’re moving out now. ‘American?’ they ask. ‘No,’ I say, ‘Australian British.’ ‘How old?’ they say, again. ‘Forty-one,’ I say. ‘Yes, we know a girl‘, they say, ’27,’ they say, ‘with a daughter. Yes, she left a daughter behind.’

Oh, I think, so that’s worse than Rach is it?

Oh Rach

The Skyping begins. Rachel interviewing Sarah for her Can Do Women blog, January 2011

Still Ronnie, standing in while Sarah is New Jersey.

Is it still too soon? I want to write Rachel something lovely. Something as good as anything I’ve ever written. (Something as beautiful as her friend Chemobabe’s eulogy, or as world-changingly essential as Gayle’s) She deserves at least that. But I can’t, yet. I need to take the fact and my feelings about her death to the park, to the cathedral, to the river – to my sacred places. I need to tell them about her. And my sense of loss. Until I’ve done that I won’t find the words, my words, for my friend Rachel.

So, for now, here is a very short poem.

Rachel

Sarah's post card painting of Plot 44. Posted to Rachel early this morning, before we knew.

Earlier today we learned that our friend and fellow blogger, Rachel, from The Cancer Culture Chronicles died this morning from the effects of metastatic breast cancer. We will have a great many words to say about our beloved friend. But not today. Today we are too sad to speak much.

The N word

November 2011, me in Sefton Park. No nipple protrusion visible.

On the morning of 18 May 2009, a Monday, I am sitting on the edge of my hospital bed, wearing a surgical gown. Mr Koshy, one of the three surgeons who is going to operate on me today, is explaining the procedure before he asks me to sign the consent form. And as this is a DIEP breast reconstruction, the explanation is pretty lengthy. In short it’s the transfer of skin and fat from your abdomen to your chest to create a new breast mound. In reality this takes at least ten hours in theatre and involves complicated connecting of arteries and vessels to make sure the fat stays alive, but also skill in creating a breast mound that matches the other breast. And while he is talking to me Mr Koshy also says, ‘And in time we would like to make you a nipple as well.’

Ah. Yes. A nipple. How great would that be I thought at the time. But it also felt like such a long way off. I mean first I have to get through this surgery, for it to be a success – DIEP surgery can fail completely or partially, all graft surgery carries that risk – and then recover, then I’ll need more surgery on my other breast to match up once the DIEP has settled, and then we could think about a nipple. It all seemed so far away, so remote. And it reminded me of the day I found out I had breast cancer, back in February 2007, when I was told I needed to have a mastectomy, and I said, ‘Can I keep my nipple?’

So my DIEP surgery was a success, a few complications but nothing major. The next surgery six months later was also a success and I was, nearly three years after diagnosis, in possession of two breasts. At least they felt like my breasts to me. The decision to have breast reconstruction was not something I decided lightly by any means, and I was happy with the result and keen to ‘get my life back’, which is where I thought I was at that point. For my reconstructed breast I had a silicone nipple, cast from my other nipple and carefully and skilfully colour-matched by the prosthetics technician, Gina. OK, I hated glueing it on