EVE COLEMAN: Living, Dying and Cancer

A Gathering of Stars and Songs and Faces -- Fragments of a Life

Table of Contents

• Preface
• Part One: Illness Songs, Watermelon Winter
• Seductive Summer
• The Fall
• My Second Winter
• False Summer
• The Beginning
• The Essence
• Illness Songs Revisited
• Step One: I Embark
• My Computer Writing

Later, when I studied poetry in high school and as an English major in college, I would come to know John Donne, the poet from whom Gunther took his title. And I would learn the poet's lesson, that death will come to all. Donne warned, And soonest our best men with thee do go.. . But death in books and poetry was abstract. While the poets I studied were to become my primers on the subject of death, personal experience would be my best source in the coming years.

When my own father, Herman Bindursky, died in October, 1970, followed by the deaths of my father-in-law, Ralph Coleman, in February, 1971, and my aunt , Esther Bindursky, in April of that same year, I began to know death in a more personal way. Death crept up when one least expected it. My sixty-two year-old father went fishing one day; on the way home he pulled his car over to the side of the road and died. This signaled the beginning of a six month period in which death permeated my life and changed the entire course of it. Death, as I was learning it then, stalked lonely roads or came swiftly--a thief in the night. Three months after my own father died, my father-in-law, a fifty-two year old physican died without warning in his own bed. By April, I had come to know firsthand, not only death the swift thief, but the kind of death which wrings out life as if it were a dirty dishrag. This dimension of death presented itself to my unmarried aunt, Esther, or Ettie as I called her; day after day I watched her slowly lose the powerful grip she held on life . All this within six months had a profound effect on Alan and me, two twenty-three year old newlyweds. During the following summer we moved from our honeymoon apartment in Memphis to Charleston and began anew.

The death of Ettie numbed me at the time, coming on the heals of the two other shocking ones. But later, it was to provide me with the material about which I hoped to write. A decade later, I began to explore how one would go about chronicling, not a death, as Gunther had done, but a life-- that of my aunt Esther Bindursky, a woman who had lived an interesting life in interesting times. I set about to write her story, but my own life was the obstacle that kept getting in the way. I dabbled at writing about her, as I dabbled at writing poetry, short stories, and essays. Meanwhile, I was running a household, raising a child, earning a doctorate, and advancing in a career. The story of Ettie was something I would get back to later.

Now that later has come, albeit prematurely, and my time is limited, I find myself looking inward, wanting to explain my own existence rather than someone elses. The question of whether I really intended to write about Ettie or myself is not a new one. It was part the critique of a preliminary manuscript in a 1988 writer's workshop led by National Book Award winner, Theodore Rosengarten. I had developed a chapter outline, preface, and one chapter of what was to be a biography of Ettie. I will include the work later, as it provides some insight into me, a Jewish girl growing up in a small southern town in the 1960's, and gives some background about a member of my family and the place from which I came.

Now, I have no time to sit on the fence and wonder where my dabbling at writing will lead. Now, I am facing my own mortality in a tangible way, not merely glimpsing it through the eyes of a father chronicling the death of his son or through the stanzas of a poetry.

For you see, I am dying. I know I will not die tomorrow; but I do face an illness that will, no doubt, prevent me from living a long life. Yet, my first glimpse of my own mortality is where I look now, back to Gunther, possibly as a way to looking forward to what lies ahead. Now, I look to Gunther, young Gunther, and others I have discovered, including Viktor E. Frankel, in Man's Search for Meaning, as a models for how I am to live out an abbreviated life. I am caught betwixt and between. I have no interest in chronicling the events which will eventually lead to my death, even though the first chapter explains my illness and the events which led up to it. This chapter places me where I am as I begin my gathering. It also explains why some of my songs remain partially finished, or even unsung. But most of this book is not about illness. This is not where I choose to invest my final energy. Rather, what follows is a gathering of parts of a life--one that will end too early, yet one that has brimmed over with experience and richness. Gunther's chronicle of his son's death was a linear account. My own chronicle here is quite different.

What follows is a gathering of the fragments of my writings and my life, some of them finished and done with, some of them to remain in progress, never to be completed or left to some other pen. I wilI embellish some and leave others as I found them. I will gather up these fragments--these stars, and songs and faces-- as Sandburg would say, and then, when it is time, I will in the words of Sandburg, loosen my hands, let go, and say goodbye.

Eve Bindursky Coleman

January, 1993

Gather the stars if you wish it so

Gather the songs and keep them.

Gather the faces of women.

Gather for keeping years and years.

And then . . .

Loosen your hands, let go and say good-bye.

Let the stars and songs go.

Let the faces and years go.

Loosen your hands and say good-bye.

Carl Sandburg

Watermelon Winter

Why me? This is the common lament of those whom illness, accident, and other misfortune strikes. Have I the answer? Absolutely not, although, I admit that I have searched deep inside myself and deep into the literature on the subject to no avail. I don't believe in a God who decides who shall experience disaster or in a God who punishes us for sins. If that were so, it wouldn't make sense that one of Al Capone's most notorious henchman recently died a peaceful death as an old man in his eighties. Yet, on every Yom Kippur, one of the few days of the year that I always attend synagogue, I, like many other Jews around the world stand breathless during the part of the service which states, on this day, it is decided who shall live and who shall die...

Last Yom Kippur, October, 1992, I could barely breath when that prayer was recited. I didn't know at the time that my breast cancer had not been checked by surgery and seven months of chemotherapy. The potentially deadly cells had loosed their bounds and were threading their way up and down my spine. What amazes me now is that my thoughts were not on whether or not the cancer had been checked or would reoccur--I had every confidence even then that I was well--but rather, my thoughts were on what a narrow escape I (thought) I had experienced.

My breast cancer story began on December 19, 1991. Even though I was 44 years old at the time, my life was still governed by school's timetables. As a college professor, my life's rhythm revolved around semesters' beginnings and endings. Routine things to be done such as doctors appointments and carpet cleaning were often squeezed into school breaks.

My yearly mammogram fell into this category. On Thursday, December 19th, I turned in my semester grades and headed for the radiologist's office--one more item I would be able to check off my list before I left with my family for our holiday in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina.

Sitting in the outer office waiting for my mammogram the thought did cross my mind that this could be the time I wasn't as lucky as I had always been in the past. I flirted with the idea of what if? The farthest my mind would take me was the loss of a breast. I remember thinking that losing a breast wouldn't be all that bad. I thought of a poem I had written about a high school English teacher I knew who had died the preceding May in an automobile accident. The poem talked about a person's essence. I remember thinking that my essence, like the teacher I had written about, wasn't tied to my body or, for that matter, to any particular body part. But still, this was all hypothetical. Within the next few hours the hypothetical--the abstract--would become reality. I would become a statistic--one in 500.

After the mammogram, the technician asked me to wait until she looked at the film before I dressed. This was standard procedure. I had been through it every year since I was 40, even though in my age group many doctors recommend only every other year and many insurance companies only pay for a mammogram every other year.

I suspected that something was wrong the minute the technician came back in the room to take a follow-up X-ray. This had never happened to me before, although I'm told it happens to many women who do not have breast cancer. "Did you see something?," I asked in a businesslike tone. "There's something here I think the radiologist would want a closer look at and since she's out right now I'll just go ahead on do it on my own; I'd hate for you to have to make another trip down here." The technician, who knew what a healthy mammogram looked like, was not convincing and I was on alert.

"What happens if there is something suspicious?" I queried.

It's standard for the radiologist to send the report to your doctor, who will let you know.

"I know that, but is that what happens even if there's something suspicious?

"The radiologist will call your doctor if there's anything suspicious."

"I'm going out of town tomorrow night. I need to find out if there's something I should attend to," I replied, as much to myself as to the technician.

When I checked out, I asked the receptionist if the radiologist was back. She was, so I asked if I could speak to her, explaining that I would be leaving town the next day and my doctor might not be able to reach me in the event there was something to tell. The receptionist went away. Returning, the receptionist stated, "The radiologist is on the phone with your doctor, now." My heart sank, but my adrenaline propelled me into action. I left the radiologist's office and drove straight to the office of my family doctor, without an appointment. When I was able to see my doctor, her face told it all. From this point on, there were no veiled responses to questions, no hedges, and no lies. For this I was grateful. Both Alan and I are the type who want to know.

My doctor confirmed that the mammogram showed what looked to be a tumor and it very possibly was malignant. She recommended the exact surgeon I would have requested, and called to see if she was available. She was, and I rushed straight over to her office. I still hadn't called Alan, but I had called Jennifer to tell her I had to see another doctor and wouldn't be home at the scheduled time. When Alan called Jennifer he, too, was on the alert.

By the time I reached the surgeon's office, Alan had tracked me down by starting with the radiologist's office. I'm surprised at myself now to think that I hadn't taken time to call him, but there were questions I had to have answered and I was on a one- track mission.

The biopsy was scheduled for the next day. Still, I felt the worst thing that would happen was that I might lose a breast. The die (no pun intended) had landed and I would deal with it if need be. That night, when I told my 78 year-old mother of the impending biopsy, she let the remark slip, "I wish it could be me instead of you; I've lived my life."

"I'm not going to die, Mother! I may just have breast cancer." She was apologetic and said she didn't mean to imply that I would die. I didn't know then that 50% of women who are diagnosed with breast cancer do, indeed, die from the disease. According to one statistic, a woman dies of breast cancer every five minutes.

But I was convinced that if I did everything right, maintained a good attitude, followed my treatment to the letter, and expected to get well, I would. Although at some level I knew the seriousness of the statistics, almost a year went by before I let those statistics enter my conscious mind. After all, I was told that I had an 80% chance for cure. That was the only statistic I let myself believe. 80% was a "good" statistic, although I do remember remarking to Alan at some point that if our daughter knew only 80% of the material for a test we would not think that was a "good" statistic. As it turned out, I never really had an 80% chance for cure because my body was keeping secrets from my doctors.

The next seven months went by in a blur. I continued to teach, while going through a regimen of chemotherapy--two Fridays on, two Fridays off, all the while taking Cytoxin, an oral chemotherapy drug, which in itself is enough to make some people lose their hair. Chemotherapy made me very sick until I was given a wonder drug for nausea, Zoftran. I cut back professional obligations, although I did manage to go to Paris for a week in March to present a paper I was scheduled to give. My doctors were very supportive about the trip. My oncologist, rearranged my chemotherapy schedule to have me "propped up" and feeling good for the trip. When I expressed the slightest apprehension about the trip to my surgeon, she said I was going if she had to go with me!

If attitude could cure a person, I should have gotten well. My spirits were high most of the time and I fully expected to get well and stay that way. I looked at these months as something I would get through on the way to the rest of my life.

When I first told my best friend, Wendy, about the impending surgery and probable hair loss, I added that I was just about as upset about the loss of the hair as the loss of the breast. She agreed that she would feel the same way. But I even managed to maintain a good attitude about the hair. When it began to fall out, I decided I didn't want Jennifer , then 13, to remember the event as a trauma. Instead, it turned out to be a "good" memory. I told her we were going to have fun with this and to pretend I was one of her old Barbie dolls whose hair she was so fond of cutting. I let her cut my hair as short as she could and then I went to a hairdresser and had the rest "buzzed" off. By then I had a wig that looked exactly like my hair had looked and very few people could tell the difference. My oncologist remarked it was one of the best wigs he'd ever seen, and he could spot one across the mall. So even the hair loss didn't throw me. However, I did have a few dark days during that first bout.

One of my low points came early on in the chemotherapy treatment schedule. One day during this period prompted the first in a series of what I have come to call my Watermelon Poems:

Watermelon Winter

January 26, 1992

Yesterday,

In the dead of my worst winter

I bought shoes...

Watermelon shoes.

That's what the salesclerk called them,

anyway.

Magenta snakeskin toes and purple snakeskin heals

Connected the flimsiest of light airy net.

And at just the place on each side

Where my arch might be, two watermelon halves

Broke through.

Bright green semi-circles with hot pink

Snakeskin center

reminded me of juicy times past and hinted that,

Indeed,

This winter may one day end

And summer come again.

Watermelon shoes.

I squinted hard to see what the clerk saw

And finally saw it, too.

Bright green rind cushioning hot pink fruit.

I took off my heavy woolen socks,

And for a minute,

Just a minute,

I glimpsed the summer that will come again.

Then I took off the shoes,

Putting them carefully away,

And slipped back into my woolen socks.

For now, the image of that box will

Have to do

As I dream of

Watermelon shoes.

And so my "Watermelon Winter" came and went. School ended and I looked forward to the end of treatments ,which I thought would signal, if not a complete cure, at least a few years where the themes of my songs--my poetry and my life-- would not be illness. But that was not to be.

Seductive Summer

As far as I knew, I was well and this was to be a continuation of wonderful summers of the past and a prelude to many that would stretch ahead. We hiked, picnicked, ate, read, relaxed, attended summer theater shows, and entertained some of our favorite out-of-town guests. My best friend and cousin by marriage, Wendy Goldman, and her daughter, Ginger, visited from Dallas. And our old friends, Diane and Paul Mendelson, came from Memphis on a weekend when Alan was there. Alan came when he could and stayed a whole week at the end.

The Fall

The Fall semester of 1992 was a difficult time for me. I attributed this to several factors, none of them even remotely related to a recurrence of cancer or the possibility that the cancer had not been checked. I had frequent bouts of crying for no apparent reason, something I had very rarely ever done before. I surmised that some of my symptoms were menopausal, the chemotherapy having thrown me into an early menopause. I wondered if, because I had sailed through the hard past months in high spirits, I could be having "post-traumatic stress" symptoms, something that had happened to me during another crisis in my life. Surely, the fact that I was using three new textbooks in three different classes and a whole new hardware/software system in the Computers for Teachers class I taught could add a great deal of stress to the other two conditions. Stressed out---that was my own diagnosis.

My three month visit with my oncologist was originally scheduled for October 23rd, the anniversary of my father's death. Even though I'm normally not a superstitious person, I'll admit I was a little relieved when the office called to reschedule the visit. The one thing that stands out in my mind about that visit is my answer to a question the oncologist asked about what worried me. I thought for a moment and the only worry I could dredge up was "I'm afraid I'm not worrying enough!" I was clearly denying the possibility that the symptoms I was experiencing could be related to the cancer.

Even when the emotional symptoms changed to physical ones, I continued to attribute them to stress. My back began to hurt in mid-November. I remember making a student laugh in class. He saw me holding my back and asked what was wrong. "The stress- monkey is on my back!' I quipped . He laughed, saying he'd never heard that expression, but as a baseball player with frequent aches and pains, he could certainly relate to my pain. The pain seemed so familiar, like pulled muscles and strains I'd had over the years. Why just the week before my friend and colleague, Pete Yaun had remarked on what I thought was muscle strain in my neck. "Why are you holding your neck like that?" Pete asked. Later, another friend, Jeanne Sink was to remark that when we had been on a trip together to a conference in Denver and had stolen a day to hike in the Rockies she noticed that I was holding my back as I went down the mountain. But for some reason I never let myself imagine that these symptoms were indicators of a serious problem. Within a week I would find out what was wrong with my back was no playful monkey, but rather an Albatross that would become a constant in my life, weighing me down with pain and worry.

The rest of the fall was filled the "finding out" and beginning new treatment. One week before Thanksgiving I experienced such severe back pain that I did what I had heard prescribed for other back pain sufferers--I lay on the floor with my back flat. The only problem was that when I tried to get up, I literally couldn't. Crying in pain, I asked Alan to call my brother-in-law, a rheumatologist, who suggested three things: Take four ibuprofen, put ice on my back, and let my oncologist know about this. The first two I did, enabling me to finally get up off the floor. But I put off calling my oncologist until the next day. He and my brother-in-law agreed there was a good chance my own diagnosis--stress induced muscle strain--sounded reasonable but a bone scan would set everyone's mind at rest. One was scheduled for Monday.

Monday's bone scan was not definitive. It showed "something," but the "what" wasn't clear. An MRI (Magnetic Resonance Imaging) was the next step. My oncologist said that from the bone scan there was a 50% chance it could be an early form of arthritis and he hoped it was. I called several friends, including Wendy, whose husband Don, exactly my age, does, indeed, have arthritis. I joked with Wendy and others "We're hoping it's only crippling arthritis!" Still, I didn't believe this was cancer-related. But is was.

The MRI, and subsequent ones, revealed the cancer had metastasized almost from top to bottom of the spine, all the way down to the lower lumbar and even into the pubic bone region. What the team of doctors, which now included the radiologist who read the MRI and a radiation oncologist, concluded is that I was one of the rare people for whom a bone scan was not as predictive as it is for most people. Rather than considering this new finding as a recurrence, the consensus was that the cancer was probably in my spine when I left the hospital after surgery in December '91, but the bone scan I had then failed to reveal it.

With this new information came a new diagnosis--Metastatic Breast Cancer--for which there is no cure. The immediate decision at hand was what to do about two impending trips. We received my new diagnosis on the Tuesday night before Thanksgiving. On Thursday I was scheduled to fly to Alexandria, LA, with my mother to a family reunion and then I was to go on alone to Dallas to visit my Aunt Elizabeth who, herself had recently been diagnosed with cancer. Alan and Jennifer had decided early in the fall to forego the visits with my family and head up to Chetola. The following weekend Alan and I were scheduled to meet Diane and Paul Mendelson in New Orleans to celebrate Paul's 50th birthday. We decided not to cancel any of these trips; there would be plenty of time later to forego travel. My radiation oncologist urged me to wear a neck brace and treat myself as if I had a cracked disc. Actually one of my discs was compressed and radiation was to begin immediately upon my return from Dallas. He warned me not to pick up any turkeys or babies! I'm not sorry we made the decision to take these trips, even though it meant postponing the real "coming to terms" with the implications of my new diagnosis. Also, I decided not to tell but one person in Alexandria about the new diagnosis, since part of the reunion was to celebrate my cousin Sonny's 65th birthday and there was no reason to put such a different light on the weekend.

When I left for the airport on Thanksgiving morning, Jennifer gave me a note and asked that I wait to read it until the plane had left the ground. With Jennifer's permission, I share her comforting words to me:

My Mommily,
I love you so unimaginably much that I can't imagine life without you. So I'll try very, very hard not to, ok? You are the bestest friend, mother, and boxing partner ever. I'm glad you're on the plane going west and we're in the car heading north. I'll take care of my daddy--your "Mr. Al." We'll (I'll ) not mope. We'll go the bagel place & to Main St. in Boone. We'll go on long, long walks in the crisp (maybe freezing) day. I'll rub his back every day. We'll all come back from our various places & be strong for you. That's what everyone needs to try to do don't 'cha think? If your hair does fall out again, can I Mohawk it for you? The less hair the better to rub your head, my dear! Definitely you should dye it. We are a mother daughter team who does everything together, right? So, when I re-dye my hair, you can borrow the rest of my dye, okay? Parles bonjour to everyone there. Take care of yourself. Don't pick up any turkeys (you might eat the whole thing! !) Don't worry about losing/gaining any more weight. Personally, I'm happier the more there is of you. Have an awesome ultra cool bogus radical trip!

I love you more than I can say.

Jennifer

Upon my return from Alexandria and Dallas, I began a series of treatments intended to extend my life--radiation, new rounds of chemotherapy, and, for the first time, professional counseling and support groups. My new songs were those of lament.

My Second Winter

The Second Winter

December 19, 1992

Summer came again

And just as quickly went.

The woolen socks

are back...

To stay

I think.

The watermelon shoes

Are put away

On a shelf I can

No longer reach.

Summer,

however brief,

May come again

This year.

But the shoes,

Too little worn

To Have Such

Saging soles,

Will walk about

No more.

But I am not, by nature, a gloomy or pessimistic person and within a few days, another poem came called, "A Glimmer of Hope":

A Glimmer of Hope

December 22, 1992

Okay, maybe,

Just maybe

I've been looking

at the shoes

all wrong.

Perhaps they're

Not worn out.

Perhaps once more

I can replace the

Heavy woolen socks

With watermelon shoes.

So what if the shoes

Are a little worse for wear.

Fading semicircles

are barely discernible

To the casual eye.

Few really look

Beneath to see

The worn out sole.

And those who do,

are content to see

A hint of what once was--

Bright green rind

Cushioning hot pint fruit.

Those who do

Look beneath the surface

Celebrate the sole below

Replete with rends and tears

It is for them,

Those who

Celebrate my soul

That I will drag

The well worn shoes

Around on wobbly legs

Until the cobblers tell me

They have sewn their last stitch.

False Summer

During that week, one of the worst of my life, I was Daniel wrestling with the lion. I fought the hard fight one day and gave up the next, barely able to get out of bed. I longed for death to come soon one minute and in the next vowed to myself to fight as hard as I could for even one more day. I made deals with God, even though I don't believe in a God who deals.

But there was one surprise. The cold I had dreaded did not come. In fact, the weather was warm and beautiful, setting record highs. I didn't know if this was a punishment or gift. During these dark days came new Watermelon songs. One poem I called "False Summer."

False Summer

December 30, 1992

Today I sat

On the porch

In the mountains

Of North Carolina

Barefoot in the

Middle of winter with,

Temperature reaching 65,

I wore neither woolen socks

Nor watermelon shoes.

Today I swam,

Albeit it indoors,

And my body forgot

its pain,

'Cept for

my soul scraping bottom.

But for the bare trees,

This could almost be

The summer day

For which I've longed.

But it is false and too soon

Will slip away.

One day, when I had finally decided to take the antidepressant which had been prescribed for me, I began thinking back to another prayer of Yom Kippur which begins, "Is this my chosen fast...," I jotted this in my journal:

Is this my chosen summer?

Sitting on a porch

In the middle of winter

Sunning myself

and starring at

Smoke on the mountain

In a drug induced semi-stupor?

The Beginning

The Essence

On the Death of Pam Weber

You were like an egg,

Smooth and unruffled,

Delicate, yet strong.

A pure, creamy shell

Protected the sun-colored

yolk of your serenity.

Now the shell is broken,

Reminder that

Within us all

Life's essence lies,

Swirling, pulsing,

Ever poised to

Break its bounds,

Shatter its fragile shell,

Seep to other surfaces.

Pam, only your shell

Cracked and broke.

The essence of your life

Still swirls,

Seeping through the cracks,

Coloring the surfaces

Of all you touched

With the sun-colored yolk

Of your serenity.

Eve B. Coleman

May 31, 1991

Throughout my illness I have thought often of this poem in relationship to myself, beginning with my thoughts in the outer area of the radiologist's office awaiting the mammogram which would set a new direction for my life. My thoughts, then, were that my own essence did not lie in my breast; if I had to lose a breast so be it. Now my musings about my essence take on a deeper meaning as I ponder what lies ahead for me...in life and beyond. If life is a journey, I wonder whether I am embarking on the last phase of it or, yet a new beginning. Whichever is the case, I wish for myself what my poem sang to Pam Weber--that it be only my shell which cracks and breaks and that the essence that is I, seep through the cracks of a broken shell and leave something behind, through the people I have touched and through the gathering in here of my songs, stars, and faces.

Illness Songs Revisited

I began a new journey of self-discovery and hope

On November 16, 1993, I was preparing a talk I was to give the next day in a sociology course called Death and Dying, taught by my friend and former colleague at the College of Charleston, George Dickinson. I would use some of the same material in an upcoming talk I was to give for the College's Women's Series luncheon to take place at the home of College of Charleston president, Alex Sanders, and his wife, Zoe, who was also slated to speak. A third speaking engagement was planned for March. I was asked to be the keynote speaker at the College's annual computer conference for teachers. My topic would revolve around how I had used my computer as a window to the outside world and as a way to help me gain a measure of control over my disease. A lot had happened to me in the past year since I retired on disability and left my position at the College. I had come a long way from the despair and depression of the winter before which had spawned my series of Watermelon Poems found in "Illness Songs." I had journeyed far, mostly into territory which was unknown to me .

My journey toward an unknown destination, which I had vowed In "Illness Songs" would be one of self-discovery and hope, had taken me to places where sometimes I was surprised to find myself. One such place was behind the lectern in a sociology course called Death and Dying. But I was to be there because I was becoming known as a woman who was coping successfully while living under dark cloud known as Metastatic Breast Cancer.

Was I coping successfully? The answer varied from month to month and sometimes from day to day or even hour to hour. As the 1993 holiday season approached, I was reminded of the dread, panic, and depression I had felt during the holiday season the year before; from that Thanksgiving on through the new year's "celebration," I had wrestled with the cruel news that was to change the direction of my life and that of my family.

I remembered the night that my oncologist, David Ellison, had first discussed my diagnosis with me. It was his day off and he came to my house in the evening to discuss the results of tests I had that day. We already knew the news was bad; the radiologist had showed us the film of the MRI, with it's black spots traveling up and down my spine, tumors dotting vertebrae from top to bottom. As we talked about my chances for the future, David made a statement that didn't mean much at the time, but that stayed with me and emerged again when I was ready to consider its implications. What he said was that I could stop living that very night or I could choose to live out whatever time I had left in a meaningful way. The choice would be mine.

The anniversary of the season of my diagnosis and its immediate aftermath was painful and sad. I still had occasional bouts of crying, doubt, depression, and panic. At these times, I often joked with my family that I felt like a sham who bore little resemblance to the profile of the woman people thought I was. Yet, even the darkest days of the "anniversary season" were intermingled with days of productivity, peace, and even gaiety . Even on my worst days, I had to admit that I had, indeed come a long way during the past year. And that journey was a story people wanted to hear. In October, 1993, the local newspaper, the Post and Courier, had carried a full page article about me, complete with pictures of our family , quotes from my oncologist about my coping capacity, and information about my situation and feelings based on a two hour interview and my "Illness Songs" chapter. The article ended with the last stanza of the poem I had written in December, 1992, entitled,

"A Glimmer of Hope"

It is for them,

Those who

Celebrate my soul

That I will drag

The well-worn shoes

Around on wobbly legs

Until the cobblers tell me

They have sewn their last stitch.

The newspaper article mentioned the recent photograph and accompanying text about me which had appeared in the October issue of Consumer Reports. I was approached about the Consumer Reports article through my involvement with the Cancer Forum of CompuServe, a computer information service which I accessed on a regular basis in order to seek support and to research treatments, both standard and experimental. With the help of Roper Hospital oncology clinical nurse specialist, Debbie Jernigan, I had started a new support group for women with recurring or Metastatic Breast Cancer. Yes, had journeyed far since November 24, 1992--the dark day when an MRI confirmed that my breast cancer, first detected in late 1991, had not been checked by surgery and chemotherapy. As I continued to consider what I would say to the Death and Dying class, I tried to recall the path that led me from the despair of the previous winter to the brink of a speech on how I cope with cancer.

Only the past winter, I had felt helpless, defenseless, depressed, out of control, powerless and passive. How had I been able to reclaim some of the control over my life that I thought cancer had taken away for good? As I planned my upcoming talks, I thought I would be asked what brought me out of my depression described in my poetry and other parts of the chapter, Illness Songs?

One of the best descriptions of the depression I had felt was one I heard Bill Moyers give as he interviewed poets, Donald Hall and Jane Kenyon ."Depression is really the land of the living dead, isn't it?" asked Moyers in a television interview shown on ETV. Kenyon, who suffers from manic depression, emphatically agreed with Moyers. I found Moyer's description an apt one. I had been to the land of the living dead for a few weeks the year before, but I had returned to the land of the living. "What," I continued to ask myself, "had enabled me to live, really live , my life during these past months filled with the ups and downs of two different regimens of chemotherapy treatments; numerous hospitalizations resulting from the effects of treatments; countless doses of IV antibiotics, many of which I infused myself at home; three blood transfusions; six rounds of radiation; and surgery to place a rod in my leg?" I pondered these questions as I reluctantly set about to do what I said I would not--continue to write about my illness in an effort to find the answers to the questions posed.

The last time I had written about my illness was the preceding January, almost 10 months before. The chapter, "Illness Songs," had told the story of my breast cancer saga, complete with its accompanying depression and death wishes. At that time I had vowed to learned to live again, but I no idea how I would do it. As I planned my talks, I realized that I had done what I set out to do, and now it was time to consider the route my journey had taken. I had vowed to embark on a journey of self-discovery and hope, although when I made that vow in early 1993, I didn't know where it would lead. I wanted to do what my oncologist had suggested--go on living a meaningful life as long as I could, but I didn't know the landscape of this new territory. I would have to forge my own path.

Following is what I think of as a kind of map of my journey. The steps I describe below are personal for me, although what I know now is that the most important part was gaining some measure of control over my life, something I thought I had lost forever. A friend helped me determine what had accounted for regaining a part of myself which a year ago I thought was lost. ***

As I continued to ponder my questions and to plan my talk for the Death and Dying class, I telephoned my friend, Kaye Sharpe, to ask her what she thought accounted for the changes in my emotional state over the past months. Kaye was in the best position of any to offer a professional judgment; she is a psychologist who had counseled me through the first difficult weeks of my diagnosis.

"Was it the mere act of telling my story--my writing itself- -that was therapeutic?" I asked Kaye. She knew that I had been writing steadily over the past months and had read much of what I had written. "Yes, that was part of it," Kaye answered pensively, "when a person tells her story, the continuity of life has more meaning. She sees her own life as part of the ebb and flow of all life, all humanity. You have always been a creative person and you channeled your creativity into the telling of your story."

Kaye continued, "Susan and I have been doing a lot of work with the idea of using story in therapy." She was referring to Susan Hull, the co-pastor of Kaye's church, Circular Congregational. "Let me read you some of my notes that I used recently in a seminar for a group I lead about the value of story in psychotherapy." She left the phone briefly and returned to read to me from her notes. "Our story is what our reality is, the way we interpret the events of our lives. This is an old Native American saying: 'Stories that people tell have a way of taking care of them. Sometimes a person needs a story more than food. That's why we put stories in each other's memories.'"

Then Kaye continued to read from her notes: "Salman Rushdic, author of The Satanic Verses, who came out of hiding to speak at Columbia University in a salute to the First Amendment said, 'Those who do not have the power over the story that dominates their life, the power to retell it, rethink it, deconstruct it, and change it as times change, truly are powerless because they cannot think new thoughts.'"

I stopped writing and asked Kaye if I could have a copy of her notes; she agreed and soon brought me not only her own notes, but also some quotes Susan Hull had assembled on telling our own story. I stopped jotting notes and just listened as Kaye continued: "Sam Keen believes that psychotherapy is about people who have lost their stories they carry around are not healing because they are not conscious. Keen believes that our stories are programmed into us..."

I became excited and interrupted Kaye at this point. "Kaye," I said, "I think that's what happened to me! When I was so depressed last year, during those weeks following my diagnosis, I had lost the thread of my own story. Writing helped me find it again."

Kaye thought what I said was probably true. Then she went on to say that telling my story was only one part of what she thought accounted for the changes in me.

"You took charge of your life," Kaye stated, "If you think of the things you've done over these past months, all of them show how you were taking charge of your life again."

Yes, that was it; I had taken charge of my life. And I could look back and pinpoint many of the very moments when it had happened. This was what I would need to convey to my audience for my talks. It was so simple, I couldn't see it at first.

As I continued to reflect on Kaye's notes and Susan's work in the weeks to come, reading for myself some of what had been written on the importance of "story" in our lives, I realized that part of taking charge of my life again had meant, as Rushdic suggests, regaining the power over my own story. Only then was I be able to, according to Rushdic, retell it, rethink it, deconstruct it, in order to pick up the thread of life--my story.

When I learned that I was dying, that my life would no longer be what it was, I could not imagine that I could have a life at all. I had heard David's words when he told me I could stop living right then--at the time of diagnosis-- or live the rest of my life, but it took time before the words made sense. Before the words made sense, I sank to a very low point. That's when went to "the land of the living dead." I became not only sick in body, but also sick in mind and spirit--depressed. Frederick Buechner seemed to be speaking just to me in his book, Telling Secrets: A Memoir. Buechner states, "...to lose track of our stories is to be profoundly impoverished not only humanly but also spiritually." When I lost my story, I lost the sense of who I was and what my life could be. What had happened to me over the past months was beginning to make sense. Only when I began to retell my story--by writing about my past and by reinventing my present--was I able to live with the specter of my unknown future. By finding my story again, I was able pick up the threads of my life and recast it. I could not regain life as I had known it, but I could regroup the resources which had served me well in my old life in order to move forward, out of the land of the living dead and toward a life of what some call, "living with cancer," rather than "dying of cancer." ***

The talk for the Death and Dying class came and went; the talk for the Women's Luncheon at the College came and went. The response to both talks was so positive that I decided to continue to reflect and write about the steps I took as I embarked upon the journey that had begun the winter before.

I thought back to the first steps I had taken to overcome my despair and, what I know now was, clinical depression. I knew at the time I would need help to deal with the emotional devastation brought about by my new diagnosis.

I wish that I could call the next section, "Steps to Recovery," for in a sense, they were. Yet, the word "recovery" implies that one is cured or that if one continues to practice the steps, then the person will be okay. But cancer is not like that. I've often said, "if a positive attitude could cure cancer, then I should be well." During my first bout with cancer and its ensuing treatment, I maintained an excellent attitude, rarely doubting that I would be completely cured as my initial prognosis indicated was possible. I continued to teach and even traveled to Paris to present a paper in the middle of that first round of chemotherapy.

Still, within four months of finishing the treatment I thought was "the cure," I was told I had Metastatic Breast Cancer--for which there is no cure. Then, what are these "steps" I took to go from clinical depression and despair to becoming the subject of a newspaper article and a speaker on how I have cope with cancer? Where do the steps lead? Unfortunately, unlike the Seven Step Program, which began as a way to control alcoholism and is now being touted by some as a way to control many types of abuse, dysfunction, and addiction, my steps do not lead to control of my disease. They do not lead to a cure. But, in the terminology of the current literature on incurable diseases, my steps did, for me, lead to what is called in the literature, healing. A distinction is made between "being cured" and "being healed." Healing, in the current vocabulary of serious illness, has more to do with finding of inner peace and coming to terms with our own mortality. In order to be healed, I think a person must take charge of as much of his or her life as the illness allows.

The steps below are the ways in which I took charge of my own life. While another person wouldn't necessarily do the things I did in order to begin the healing process, the important thing for any person, sick or well , is to be able to feel some measure of control over his or her life. We're all on a journey, and we're all at different stages of that journey. I am indebted to Kaye Sharpe for helping me embark on my journey and to Susan Hull for supplying me with quotes that have helped me, in retrospect, view my own journey in a more universal sense. And I am indebted to my oncologist, David Ellison for not only allowing me, but also encouraging me , to become a full participant in my own treatment. It is because of these people and many others, including my family, that I have journeyed to the point where I can now share part of that journey with others.

Step One: I Embark

Therapy as Therapy

I felt I would need professional counseling to come to terms with what was happening to me. I asked Kaye for names of psychologists who worked with terminally ill patients. Eventually, she settled on Susan Hull, a striking beautiful woman who had worked extensively with very sick patients before coming to Charleston as assistant pastor to Kay's congregation, Circular Congregational Church. The one question I asked Kaye was, "Does she have children?" When she replied that Susan did not have children, I asked Kaye if she would see me herself and if it didn't work out, then she could refer me to someone who might be more objective. But objectivity wasn't what I was looking for in a psychologist now. I didn't feel that I had time to waste establishing a new relationship. I didn't know then that Susan Hull would provide me with valuable help in another way.

Kaye agreed to see me. We set up regular appointments. For our first session, she came to my house because I had my first treatment of a new round of chemotherapy the day before. After that, I was able to drive to the sessions at her home. We met several times in December. Kaye helped me work through some my deepest concerns about my daughter, Jennifer. It seemed that I was distancing myself from her as if it would be less painful in the end if we weren't as close. I was able to overcome this "distancing" eventually and Jennifer and I were draw even closer to one another.

My Computer Writing as Therapy

You may in the privacy of the heart take out the album of your own life and search it for the people and places you have loved and learned from yourself, and for those moments in the past-- many of them half forgotten--through which you glimpsed, however dimly and fleetingly, the sacredness of your own journey.

Frederick Buechner

The Sacred Journey

My journey of self-discovery and hope had taken me to places I thought I could no longer travel, both in the real and in the metaphoric sense. I had fought my way up rugged terrain, out of the pit which was clinical depression. Even though I teeter sometimes on the brink of that deep hole, occasionally losing my footing for a time, I try to remain on the high ground. My journey out was too difficult to chance the trip again.

As for more tangible trips, I had traveled to Boston and Maine with my family and my IV antibiotic bag. I had traveled, alone with my daughter Jennifer to the outer edges of Prince Edward Island and found peace as we drove our rental car around the island, going to the western cliffs of the remote Acadian country overlooking the...Yes, I had traveled far.

(Eve Coleman passed away in the Spring of 1994. The purpose of this article is to share some Eve's legacy with the rest of the world. -- Loren Buhle)