O Sole Mio SUNdays — Cathy’s Story

Each Sunday, I devote my blog to the stories of others who let their Moonlight times inspire them to let the positive blossom from the negative. This week’s story is about my soul-sister, Cathy Higgins, who is now in month eight of her battle against Glioblastoma Multiforme.  Cathy’s story is told from my perspective and my point of view as a “visitor” within her journey.  I’ve asked her to contribute her own perspective to the story as well.  Cathy’s Journey is the true epitome of all that is O Sole Mio Sundays. Please read on…

  

The date was Saturday, July 7, 2007. I remember the date vividly because I was attending a wake for my husband’s 100-year-old grandmother. Boy, do Italians know how to mourn the dead; especially those who lived for a century.  While I was eating lunch, my cell phone buzzed.  I saw that it was my friend Cathy calling and I let the call go to voicemail.  I was enjoying pasta and meatballs and was engrossed in a very interesting conversation with one of my father-in-law’s oldest friends.  I was learning about our city’s version of “Little Italy” and was deep into the story.  When we finished, I went outside to retrieve my message.  My breath evaporated, my heart sank, and my stomach began spinning.  Cathy was calling to tell me she was in the hospital and had been told she had a brain tumor.  Just a few days earlier we were at work together and she was perfectly fine.  A brain tumor? There must be a mistake.

I visited her the following day and the last eight months have been almost like an out-of- body experience.  I’ve watched my dear friend wake up from what was to be a simple surgery (the doctors had told her that it was an operable tumor that might not even be a tumor at all).  Instead, the surgery lasted hours, and she woke to find out she has Glioblastoma – the most terrible type of tumor on the brain tumor market.  The surgeon tried to remove as much as possible, but left some of the tumor behind.  He was afraid he’d cause a mortal stroke if he tried to remove it all.  While he didn’t have the pathology report at the time, he told Cathy that she’d likely have three months to live without treatment; maybe six with aggressive chemo and radiation.  Her son, who is also a colleague of mine, text messaged me with the news.  It was all I could do not to throw up.  I then had to deliver the most terrible news to my immediate staff and to our whole organization.  The shock and awe on the faces of the individuals who had all become so close to Cathy was unbearable. 

You have to realize, that just days before – despite appearing a little tired and in need of some lipstick – Cathy was perfectly fine.  She was working, playing, laughing, and participating in life.  Then, out of nowhere, she has a seizure, falls unconscious to her floor at home, and is rushed to the hospital in the ambulance that her teenage daughter had to summon to her rescue.  Doesn’t this only happen on television?

I was with Cathy on the day she was discharged from the hospital and when she received the pathology report confirming the earlier diagnosis.  And although not always physically – mentally and emotionally I’ve been with her through every step of this journey since. Cathy refused, utterly refused, to accept that she had only three to six months to live. She promptly left Erie and moved into her husband’s apartment in Cleveland, Ohio.  Jeff commuted between Erie and Cleveland for a job he literally had just started weeks before Cathy’s diagnosis.  Everything happens for a reason and I truly believe Jeff took his current position because of divine intervention.  Cathy began significant treatment at the Cleveland Clinic and having a nearby apartment would prove to be a God-send in the months that followed.

Since August, my dear friend has undergone months of radiation, months and months of chemotherapy and twice-weekly infusions of a clinical trial drug. She’s gone through a move to a larger apartment in Cleveland, one that could accommodate her kids during weekend visits, her dogs, and a longer-than-planned stay in the other Mistake-on-the-Lake. She, like me, was deathly afraid of getting into an MRI machine and now is a pro.  Needles? What’s the big deal? She’s experienced complete hair loss, months of body-damaging effects from steroid treatments, and a change in her appearance. She’s lost the ability to walk more than 10 feet without assistance and constantly worries about her two children – who remain in Erie –one to attend high school and the other to maintain employment and continue college studies.

And despite all this tragedy, my Cathy remains positive and hopeful and she refuses to give up hope in the fight towards a cure.  Her willingness to participate in a lengthy clinical trial will aid cancer research and may help another patient someday in the future. 

When I landed in the hospital – the same hospital where Cathy received her diagnosis, I was scared to death that I, too, had a Glio.  While in the ER, my heart rate was nearly 120 and the doctors rushed me into a CAT Scan to rule out a brain tumor.  They knew they weren’t going to be able to do much to help me until that option was ruled out.  I sobbed with relief when they told me it wasn’t a tumor.  And, then for the first time, I felt what it must have been like for Cathy in July, but with different results.  All the ER team could tell me was that I didn’t have a brain tumor and I hadn’t had a stroke.  But, they knew something was seriously wrong and only three days later would we hear that it was M.S.  I vowed, right then in the ER, to handle whatever was to come my way gracefully and with a sense of humor – just like my soul sister Cathy.  I didn’t think I had to the strength to keep the promise though.

Not until they wheeled me into my hospital room.  Once I was settled in, got my bearings, and rested my head back on to the pillow, it hit me.  I looked across the hall in the quiet wing (there was only one other patient anywhere near me) and I saw it — Cathy’s room.  Of all the hospital beds, in all the rooms, on all the floors, in all the gin joints in the world, I was placed directly across the hall from the room I visited just four months before.  At night, when I couldn’t sleep, when I was crying and scared to death, I’d walk across the hall to that empty room and sit in the visitor’s chair.  That room gave me strength, that room brought me peace. That room and my memories of Cathy laughing, joking, crying, and praying, gave me the strength to prepare for whatever news I would receive.

When Cathy called me in the hospital, after hearing of my news, we laughed at our joint misfortune.  You see, Cathy and I had only known each other for less than a year at that point.  She moved to “my” town with her husband and kids when he relocated for work.  She took a job on my team at work and we became fast friends.  In fact, she became fast friends with just about everyone in the organization.  It’s just who Cathy is.  We didn’t know how or why we clicked until that day, but when laughing on the phone, we realized that we were brought together for a reason.  Both of our brains had sparkles, although hers was much nastier than mine.  I think we entered each other’s lives to provide support for both of our journeys. You have to imagine the phone conversation: “Can you believe it Kim?  I have a brain tumor, you told me when I was diagnosed that you knew something was wrong with your brain, too, and now you have M.S.! What the hell is happening to us?” (And then a few expletives rapidly followed).  There was really nothing either of us could do but laugh at that point.

I asked Cathy, a week or so ago, to contribute something to this column.  I asked her to explain how she has made it through this inexplicable experience and how she still has been able to find the Sunshine in her life.  Here is what she shared:

 What is Sunshine to a newly diagnosed cancer patient? To tell you the honest truth – in 47 years of being alive I really didn’t know what a true Sunshine moment really was.  Sure – I got excited about new things happening – my marriage, the birth of my children, my precious GED students.  Until the big “C” diagnosis I would let Sunshine brush my cheek but I would move on to the next worry, the next achievement, and to the next attempt at basking in Sunlight.  Who would have thought it would take a death sentence to really let rays of Sunshine into my life to really appreciate.  Although I have taken Pinky on ( my tumor’s nickname) and have no intention of letting him kill me, I do have to say that this disease has taught me that true faith is walking to the edge of my light and taking one – more- step.  There and only there have I learned how to let in the Sunshine.  Sometimes – I get scared and leap back a little and there is always someone there like my Kim who can say just the right thing and point me back toward the warmth of love and Sunshine. 

On Thursday of this week, I received another jaw-dropping call from Cathy.  For months now, her MRI reports have come back with glowing reviews.  The tumor remained at the same size as post-surgery and it appeared all the God-awful treatments Cathy had weathered had been worth it – until Thursday.  Cathy and Jeff received the news that her tumor had grown by 40% just within the last eight weeks.  Cathy wasn’t all that surprised.  She had been experiencing a rebirth of the same symptoms she had experienced when she first landed in the hospital – involuntary arm movements and excruciating headaches.  The MRI also showed what may be another small tumor on the frontal lobe of her brain.  It could; however, be a lesion instead.

On Tuesday, Cathy will have a craniotomy.  Her neurosurgeon from the Cleveland Clinic believes she can resect part of the tumor.  If nothing else, she hopes to reduce the cranial pressure that has caused Cathy to remain on debilitating steroids for the last months.  Cathy will actually be awake for a portion of the 5-6 hour surgery, so they can brain map their way to the tumor.  (I told her she better be careful what she says and does when they poke at different parts of her brain. She’s notorious for singing “Fever” and it wouldn’t surprise me if she broke out into song mid-surgery. She may announce to the world her deepest secrets, or may find out that she can actually speak Latin)!  They plan to place chemo wafers right into the brain cavity to attack “Pinky” head on.  A few weeks after this latest surgery, she’ll return to her chemo routine, although she’s been removed from the clinical trial and radiation procedures.

I talked to Cathy again on Friday, after the news had settled in, and she sounded better than I’ve heard her in months. She is once again fighting mad and isn’t going to let Pinky rule her life or her world.  This is the epitome of true Sunshine in the face of the worst kind of Moonlight.

I’d ask that you pray for my friend and her family on Tuesday – wherever in the world you may be.  If you’re not one to pray, sing a verse or two of “Fever” in her honor. Send your Sunshine rays to Cleveland and to a dear person who deserves your prayers so much more than me. 

 Interested in submitting a story for O Sole Mio SUNdays? What are the rules? There really aren’t any. I don’t care if your story is long or short. It doesn’t matter what your Moonlight situation was — whether M.S.- related or something else. Submit your stories to me and I’ll post them here. A lot of folks read this blog, so please let me know if you’d like your email address included with your story. Send along a photo if you’d like and I’ll post it, too.

The only request I have is that you make a connection for my readers, explaining how your Moonlight inspired you. Describe the opportunities and the gifts you received from your Moonlight times and find a positive side to your story. Not everyone likes to talk about themselves, so if you have story about a loved one, a friend, someone who inspired you, send me their stories, too. As you can tell, we also take recommendations of nationally-published news stories that follow the themes portrayed here on Sunshine and Moonlight. Please submit appropriate links and citations when necessary. Click here to send Kim YOUR story! And, then be sure to visit Sunshine and Moonlight each Sunday for Ole Sole Mio SUNdays!