Thank You, Gail … by Deb Jess Riley

Gutsy.

Brave.

Honest.

Funny. (“Fuck you, Joan Didion.” “Eat a lot of red dye.”)

True.

Damn good writing…magnificently written.

All of these were thoughts–some redundant, none adequately capturing quite what I feel–that I scribbled while reading Gail Konop-Baker’s amazing debut memoir, Cancer is a Bitch.

I’ve had the pleasure of meeting Gail, and she’s just as honest, funny, and true as her writing. She’s also incredibly kind, gentle, and generous. (Apparently, my adjectives are like pairs of tube socks: they come in sets of three.)

Cancer is a Bitch resonated with me on a level I didn’t anticipate before I opened it. Because it so eloquently sent me back to a time in my own life that I don’t like to remember…and I’m not sure I’ve ever blogged about it. When I was a junior in college, my annual gynecological exam revealed moderate cervical dysplasia. Sadly, a common enough finding for many young women today—but at the time, at the naïve, still relatively unbruised age of 21, all I heard were the words “cancerous cells.” And then, “biopsy.” And “cryotherapy.” And my world unraveled.

The worst part of my own diagnosis was not the understanding that I would need to go through myriad humiliating, cramping tests and treatments, or the fear that the dysplasia would return again and again and again (it did), or the worry that I’d have so much of my cervix melted off that it would never help hold a baby inside when that time came…the worst part to my 21 year-old mind was the belief that I did this to myself through my own carelessness. And all of the shame and self-reproach and reckoning with my own fledgling sexuality that entailed. Compounding this was the awareness tucked in the back of my mind that I was damn lucky to have the regular medical care that caught those ugly, insolent cells early, that my parents’ insurance would pay for my timely treatments, that most likely, I’d be alright. Thousands of women don’t have that luxury. So knock off the self-pity already, right?

Anyway, I parlayed some of those emotions, and my resultant hypochondria, personal lifestyle changes, and obsession with my own mortality into lots of bad poetry (“Like turtles flipped on their backs before oncoming trucks, we don’t consider the sky until forced to.” Urgh!). I also funneled those feelings into a major health challenge I inflicted upon my protagonist in Driving Sideways.

The bottom line: Gail NAILS it in her response to her cancer diagnosis and treatment—from the ‘blurry pods of artificial light’ above an operating bed to the sudden and alarming urgency of time, and the aftershocks sent throughout her relationships with her husband, family, friends, and herself. And she does so beautifully, in a way so raw and real, brave and afraid, that reading her memoir actually felt like a form of therapy for myself. Her honesty is uplifting and heartbreaking. It made me laugh and cry and worry and cheer, it reminded me that every day is a gift. Look around, make peace, be grateful, be authentic, revel in life…call that friend, the one you always promise to meet for lunch. Just do it. No matter how busy you are.

Gail’s memoir is a gorgeously written love letter to life–one to savor, one to learn from, one to celebrate. One that will have an honored spot on my bookshelf.

Deb Jess

October 3rd, 2008 | Posted by Jess | Cancer Is A Bitch, breast cancer | 9 Comments

Not A Sonnet, But Something In Purple Satin by Deb Danielle Younge-Ullman

I wrote goofy sonnets for each of the other deb releases this year. I don’t know if I can do that for this book. But bear with me…

What I want, after reading Cancer is a Bitch, is to run out and live my life. I want to hurl myself into the person I am supposed to be, the person I’m still becoming but some days backsliding from, hiding from, running away from.

I want to shut down the restlessness that keeps me awake at night and drives me to haunt real estate listings looking for my dream house, my dream city (or charming country town), looking for a place in which I can finally be me and my family can be happy and safe and less stressed. Because of course I would get there and start yearning for something else; a cottage, a farmhouse, a houseboat, more happiness, more safety, less stress…

I want to look at the flaws in myself and the people around me with more patience and acceptance. At the same time I want to fix everything immediately and stop tolerating all bullshit, from any source.

I want to go to Italy and run
A marathon, or maybe just a half…
I want to accept that I hate to run.
I don’t want to, but I’ll rhyme the line with calf

And think about hospital staff
And Gail, sometimes joking
And sometimes avoiding their eyes,
And pressing pen to paper in her solitary hut,
Candle lit, mojo burning,
And waking up each day asking for more,
More life, more everything.

And praying and fighting and thinking and worrying
About thinking and worrying too much,
And looking for change and truth and
Finding everything changed and also nothing at all…

I want to not write a sonnet when a sonnet doesn’t want to be written,
To take bellydancing and kiss Michael more often,
And somehow memorize everything, say everything
And not spend a fraction of a second of my time
on people who are stupid or shallow or mean
or who want me to be less—less of anything.

I want to be brave and give freely
And dress my scars in purple satin,

And cure cancer, damn it.

Deb Danielle (who is still wearing her tiara, misses you all terribly and is so proud and honored to be part of this incredible and expanding group of damned scribbling women)

October 2nd, 2008 | Posted by Danielle | Cancer Is A Bitch, goals | 12 Comments

Ugh. Cancer. By Deb Lisa Daily

Ugh. Cancer.

That’s what I thought the first time I heard about Gail Konop Baker’s debut memoir, CANCER IS A BITCH (Or, I’d rather be having a midlife crisis.)

I have a number of friends who are breast cancer survivors. Several of my great aunts, women I loved and admired were afflicted with various forms of cancer. I do the walk every October, donate whenever someone asks me to, offer hugs and lasagna for friends who have received the terrifying diagnosis.

But I don’t want to read about cancer. I don’t want to think about cancer. I especially don’t want to spend the few hours I have to myself reading a cancer book.

When the 2008 Debs and I started blogging together last year, we didn’t know very much about each other, other than our book titles and that we’d been hand-picked by founder Kristy Kiernan. But Eileen, Danielle, Jenny, Jess, Gail and I got to know each other through a year of writing and reading each others posts.

What I learned about Gail was that she is funny and thoughtful and interesting and strong. In the beginning, I planned to read her book because it was the nice thing to do. But after a year of reading her posts, I was shockingly, actually excited to finally read her book CANCER IS A BITCH when it came out.

And while Gail’s book has CANCER in the title, and CANCER is the catalyst for her journey, it is not really a book about cancer.

It’s hilarious and heartwarming and sad and brave and wonderful. It is the kind of book that keeps you up all night while you prune in the bathtub and your butt falls asleep because you’ve been sitting in there so long but you don’t want to get out because you’re just going to read one more page. Or two more pages.

It’s about the strength and humor and balls of a woman whose perspective was changed by her circumstances.

And isn’t that what the very best stories are all about.

Read it.

Deb Lisa

October 1st, 2008 | Posted by Lisa Daily | Cancer Is A Bitch, breast cancer | 14 Comments