A tale of two cancers
One year after the writer discovered she had breast cancer, her sister in California received the same diagnosis. They both recovered, but their experiences were worlds apart.
By Catherine Gordon
Late one sunny Saturday morning about a year and a half ago, my cellphone rang as I was heading out to the garden at my home in Toronto with my coffee and my morning paper. It was my big sister, Karen, calling from California. “You’re not going to believe this,” she said, sounding exhausted. “I’ve just found out I have breast cancer.”
Actually, I didn’t have any trouble believing it. Not because of the statistics: about 26,000 Canadian women and over 250,000 women in the United States will be diagnosed with breast cancer in 2017. Or because Karen had already had cancer. Or even because at least five women in my circle of friends had been treated for it in the last few years.
The news didn’t surprise me because I have it too. In fact, when this story is published, it will be almost two and a half years since I learned about my own breast cancer.
Two sisters, two countries, two cancers. On the surface of it, our experiences were very similar: we both received excellent treatment, we had lots of support and we’re recovering well. But there were some important differences that I think are worth talking about.
More than half a million women around the world die of breast cancer every year, and yet nobody knows for sure who will get it or why. Lots of environmental and lifestyle factors have been associated with higher risk: how much you exercise, what you eat, how much you weigh and whether you smoke or have had hormone replacement therapy. But the two most significant risk factors are simply being a woman and getting older.
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