Thursday, September 30, 2010

Cancer Envy

SARCOMA SARCOMA SARCOMA SARCOMA SARCOMA SARCOMA SARCOMA SARCOMA SARCOMA SARCOMA SARCOMA SARCOMA SARCOMA SARCOMA SARCOMA SARCOMA SARCOMA SARCOMA SARCOMA SARCOMA SARCOMA SARCOMA SARCOMA SARCOMA S
and in case you didn't hear, SARCOMA.
Jillian died last week from SARCOMA. Twenty-three, beautiful, loving, full of life. She loved theatre and choir.
Sarcoma attacks the young. It is a disease of the young. It is childhood cancer. It is young adult cancer... and some older people get it, too. SARCOMA steals our children. Chris's daughter. My daughter.
SARCOMA is different.
SARCOMA is under-researched. SARCOMA is under-funded.
Jillian died eight weeks before her wedding.
SARCOMA is unfair.
Maura died just shy of 23. She, too, was plucked from her full life. And from mine. And her sisters' and her dad's and everyone's life that knew her and loved her. Plucked. Excised. Resected.

Tomorrow I will celebrate the beginning of breast cancer awareness month by attending the book signing for Promise Me. I am so grateful to have Maura remembered in this book. I am so happy to have SARCOMA mentioned.
And, knowing that my other two daughters and myself have more of a chance of getting breast cancer than SARCOMA, I am thankful for the great strides that have been made to cure breast cancer.
And Joel and I will be part of the Susan G. Komen 5k Walk for the Cure on Saturday.
I wish it were that simple.
To walk and find a cure.

I wish Maura had had breast cancer instead of SARCOMA. Then, when the adriamicin didn't work, there would have been lots of other approved, vetted drugs available to continue the fight.

Most people don't even know what SARCOMA is.

And we will walk in the hope that fewer women will die or suffer from breast cancer. And that the strides in breast cancer treatment will somehow be beneficial to SARCOMA treatment too.

1 comment:

Sue G said...

Erin, thank you so much for the help you have given Chris. She is really struggling right now...as a mom, as a caregiver, as someone whose entire purpose was filled with making her daughter comfortable and finding a cure.

It was gracious and generous of you to reach out to her. It was...well...you.