"Oh, I just died from embarrassment," we tell our friends with a laugh when relating a story about an awkward social moment.
We don't mean it literally, but sometimes it is all too true. When embarrassment keeps us from seeing the doctor about an issue of sexual or breast health, we court death.
There has been... Read more
A few weeks ago I found myself with twenty of my colleagues in a classroom doing chest compressions on plastic dummies. Our school thinks we should know CPR, so there I was pressing away on a dummy's chest when my own chest and side muscles on the right started to cramp.
I was wearing the compression sleeve that I always... Read more
Yesterday I got the news that an on-line friend died of inflammatory breast cancer six years after her diagnosis. Earlier this month a friend I’ve known thirty-six years died suddenly from heart problems related to her cancer treatments. What did my friends have in common? A positive attitude.
A woman I know from... Read more
How often in your cancer journey have words failed you? I’m an English teacher, so I have a high regard for the power of words to express the jumbled emotions of coping with serious illness as patient or caregiver. But sometimes there are no words. That’s when I tend to go to bed and pull the covers over my... Read more
If you are having so much trouble deciding between the villa in Italy or the ski chalet in Switzerland for your second vacation home that you might buy them both, then this column is not for you. If you just took a third job because your rent went up and you are having trouble putting food on the table, this column may not be not for... Read more