Scholarships for Cancer Survivors and their Families

Yes, it really is time to start thinking about the school year again.



FinAid, a source for all sorts of financial aid information, has a page dedicated to Cancer Scholarships.


This looks like a great resource.


Be sure to scroll all the way down through the list. About two-thirds of the way down you'll get to the category of scholarships for "Children of Parents Who Have/Had Cancer."


Some (but not all) of the listed scholarships are limited to breast cancer patients and/or their families.

'Fessing Up

I've been having a lot of fun. Last summer, I spent much of the summer coping with chemo, recovering from surgery, and dealing with an unplanned three-day-hospital stay because of a bleeding colon polyp.

This summer, I've been on two vacations and when we haven't been away I've been hanging out with my friends and family. We've been roller skating, at the movies, at the water park, attending the free concerts in the park, and so on and so on.

It's been delightful but...my clothes are getting tight.



Yesterday, my friend and I took our little people to the local water park. I was floating along in the Lazy River, burning perhaps 2 calories per hour, and I told my friend:

"One of my most popular posts is One Naturally Thin Person's Habits and Resolutions. I need to read it and remember what I said."





So here's the deal: I'm not going to turn this blog into a weight loss journal (I promise!) but I'm making a public statement that I'm going to reverse the upward trend. Because that's what a naturally thin person does, right? I'm at the top of my personally-acceptable range. Blech.


For starters, I'm going to make sure that I get my exercise first thing in the morning, before it gets too hot.



I'm going to make sure that I get enough sleep. For me, sleep deprivation leads to junk calories. And I've been staying up late and getting up early. Sometimes it is worth it (like when I took the teens to the midnight release of the Harry Potter movie), and sometimes it is not (like when I stay up to watch more episodes of I Dream of Jeannie).

Review: "Cancer Vixen" by Marisa Acocella Marchetto

"Cancer Vixen" is a graphic novel written by a professional cartoonist who was diagnosed with breast cancer at age 43.

I've had this book in the TBR (to be read) section of my mind for some time, so when it was chosen for Discussing Breast Cancer's monthly read, I was finally motivated to actually getting around to reading it.

Going in, I was 50/50 on predicting whether or not I'd enjoy this book.

My biases going in:

Pro: I L00000VE graphic novels. Ever since I discovered Maus, I've been smitten with the form.

Con: I can't stand chick lit - probably because my idea of fashion is replacing my Levis and my Born shoes when they wear out. The cover, the dust jacket, and what I'd already heard about "Cancer Vixen" tipped me off that shoes and shopping were going to be major themes.

The Result? I do think that "Cancer Vixen" is a great read, and very creative. Everyone has a unique and interesting cancer story, but not everyone has Marisa Acocella Marchetto's unique talent to convey it graphically.

There are numerous panels that are just so clever that I find myself looking at them over and over again.

According to several websites, Cate Blanchette will be starring in the upcoming movie. Hmmm. Unless the movie gets glowing reviews, I won't bother seeing it. For me, it was the form of this book that really swept me away, not the love story or the hip, urban setting.

Useful Links:


More About the Book
Review from Discussing Breast Cancer

Mental Gyrations

Last week, we were on our way to Walt Disney World and had a car accident. We were very lucky that no one was seriously injured and that the car was still able to limp its way to Disney.

I was seated in the front, passenger seat. Right after the impact, I recall this split second of wanting to turn around to check on my family but being terrified at what I might discover.


(One of my boys had to be taken to the hospital for observation, but he was totally OK.)

As far as the car, it still needs a lot of work. We had to drive home from Florida (10+ hours ) with no air conditioning. Ugh.

The experience was unsettling, but it could've been so much worse. And except for the accident, we had a fantastic trip. We met another family there, so in total there were nine of us on the vacation. It was an intense, crazy, and wonderful week. It was the closest that I've come to having a week wherein I didn't even think about cancer.

I admit to checking my reconstructed breasts obsessively for changes or oddities. But when I'm away, I avoid checking them. Who wants to find something on vacation? It's not like I'd immediately fly home. So I just do my best to ignore my breasts for a week.

The night we got home I had a dream that there was a raised ridge on my left (non-cancerous) side. When I woke up I thought, wow, that's really weird that I actually haven't had cancer dreams. I haven't dreamt that my hair fell out again, or that my cancer came back, etc.

Now, don't say "yeah, right" about this next part, OK? A day after that dream I found a raised ridge, but it was on my right (cancer) side. Uh-oh. Except that it was ethereal. Sometimes I could locate it and sometimes I could locate only part of it. Sometimes it was a ridge and sometimes it was two discrete circles (lumps? nodules?), sometimes three circles.

I began to suspect that it was part of my implant. One of my Survivor friends suggested that it might be the fill valve.

Fortunately, I was due for a follow-up with my plastic surgeon and indeed I am feeling the fill valve. Nothing to fret over at all.

By the way, the car accident made me so glad that I'd chosen saline implants. With saline, if the implant is broken it completely deflates. There is no need to wonder whether or not it is intact.

The plastic surgeon asked me about scheduling nipple reconstruction. "No way," I told him. Reconstructed nipples are always erect. Right now I can wear a thin tank top and look great. I can go without a bra. As far as I'm concerned nipples would just mess up how I look in my clothes. Thanks-but-no-thanks.