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May 10, 2013 Turbulent ride called cancerMELANIE PRESTONI’ll begin tongue-in-cheek, as I fasten my seat belt and prepare for take-off. I’m departing Fort Lauderdale, Fla., where I have been visiting my mother who has stage-four lung cancer. When I get to New York, I’ll be visiting my good friend Hallie, who has stage-four breast cancer. It was Hallie who was diagnosed first, in 2010. She had just spent years caring for her charismatic actor of a father, who took a bad fall and left her buried in paperwork and responsibilities. During this time, she had a mammogram that showed up clear. A year later, however, a mammogram showed she had stage-four, and doctors looked back and saw they had missed what would have been an early discovery of the disease. Hallie and her mom, both professional writers, began a blog about her cancer journey immediately, documenting the onslaught of options recommended by doctors, naturopaths and loved ones. Hallie took it to another level, beautifully (and almost comically) describing the intellectual and emotional labyrinth one embarks on when this new reality crashes down on a person with the spontaneity, fierceness and permanence of a tornado. My mother and I both received these blog updates, and were two of the people sending suggestions, mainly alternatives, as my mom has spent her life barely taking an aspirin no matter how badly she was feeling. Well, little did we know, as we read Hallie’s story, that much of what we were learning and discovering would help us immensely a year later, when my mom received her own diagnosis. In her case, she was going in for a standard hip replacement surgery. She had waited (and limped) for a good three years to have this surgery, waiting for Medicare to kick in at age 65. A standard pre-op chest X-ray was required – but what was that spot? Blessing #1: she had almost selected a doctor who would not have required said X-ray, and undergone a major surgery that could have been catastrophic. How can I speak of blessings when I am talking about cancer? Well, she was stopped in her tracks and, for my mom, anything slower than full throttle was nothing short of a miraculous breakthrough. Being an East Coast family, the “no worries” culture of Vancouver was, and continues to be, completely foreign to all of us. I myself suffered tremendously when I moved here, and continue to insist that the culture shock of the West Coast surpassed that of the 30 foreign countries I have been to. However, I suppose through osmosis, the goal to be and exist in as serene as environment as possible became something I stopped resisting, so when my mom got her terrible news, I found myself able to soothe her and keep her in the moment, not allowing her to leap into panic mode before she had reason to (Blessing #2). Fear was justified though, as we unfortunately learned soon after that the cancer had already metastasized to the brain, making it an instant stage-four and, therefore, “incurable” diagnosis. Online I saw that two to seven months was a “median prognosis” for this sort of cancer. I felt my own panic beginning, yet my mom, forever strong as an ox, was already writing her own blog, following much of the advice Hallie had written in hers, including seeing a “cancer coach,” a woman in New York City who cured her own pancreatic cancer in the 1990s after being told she had weeks to live. Her savior was an oncologist who has spent his career formulating supplements and food diets for all types of cancer in each and every body. (The disease reacts differently in every single person, which is precisely why it is so challenging to treat.) In addition to this new regime, she began meditating again, doing special breathing exercises, going to physical therapy and she even tried Kundalini yoga, which I introduced her to – again, something I learned about (and swear by) living in Vancouver. It has been a year and a half since her diagnosis. The chemo kept the spreading at bay for awhile but, after an ineffective third-line treatment and minor growth, she has chosen to abandon chemo for now and is fully committing herself to an abundance of alternatives. She has an incredible partner in my father (Blessing #3: relationships improve instantaneously) and has had no choice but to live in the moment, to the best of her ability, for the first time in her life. In closing, I must share some sad news, as I now sit on my return flight from New York City to Fort Lauderdale. My first visit with Hallie was on Friday, April 26, and within hours her breathing had slowed to a dangerously low point and I found myself riding front seat in an ambulance with her to the hospital. The following night, a circle of family and friends surrounded her, as a rabbi closed Shabbat with prayers and songs. Hallie had some words with us, telling us she loved us, and then became very unresponsive for several days. On the night of Monday, April 29, her friend, John Montagna, played the guitar by her side and we sang to her; this was beautiful and precious and will remain in my heart forever. On April 30, hours before I had to depart for the airport, I watched Hallie take her last breath. I sit here in shock, beginning a mourning process I was not prepared for this soon. I find my senses on overload – noticing the smells, colors and sounds of life around me. I find myself grateful for having had the chance to be supportive to her and her family during these last few days of her life. I dedicate this piece to Hallie Leighton (Dec. 15, 1970-April 30, 2013), a woman I met in Israel, who was brilliant, inspiring and even had a law passed that will lead to the early detection of breast cancer in countless women in the future. I send healing light to her amazing mother, Lynda Myles, who just lost her only child, and to her brother, Ross Leighton, who lost his only sibling. My mother continues to fight like a warrior through the ups and downs of this rollercoaster called cancer. To all those battling this unforgiving disease, and to those who have lost loved ones to it, I send love, strength, light and healing energy. Melanie Preston made Vancouver her home in 2010 after living in Tel Aviv for four years. She has traveled the world and adores immersing herself in new cultures. She is a writer and actress and will next be seen in Peninsula Production’s Canadian première of The Game’s Afoot by Ken Ludwig, to be performed this July in White Rock. P.S. On Oct. 13, 2010, an article appeared on cnn.com about Hallie Leighton’s initial missed diagnosis (“When a mammogram isn’t enough,” by Elizabeth Cohen, CNN.com senior medical correspondent). It contains the following non-medical advice:
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