The Announcement...Jan. 16

Friends,

First of all, i'm sorry that i'm sending you this news via email. In an ideal world i would call each of you... Second, in mid december i found a lump in my right breast. There have been many doctor's appointments since then, a surf trip to mexico and finally a surgical biopsy last week. The pathology came back earlier this week and I have been diagnosed with "Ductal Carcinoma In Situ." For those of you that know Breast Cancer, this is a pretty good thing--basically it is stage 0 noninvasive cancer. The bad news (as if that part wasn't bad), is that while the cancer cells are non invasive, they appear to be somewhat scattered. thus making it difficult for them to simply "remove" the bad spot. Thus, the recommended treatment is a mastectomy on at least one side. apparently there will be some investigation into the other side.

Good news...mastectomy means no chemo and no radiation...and noninvasive means that it is pretty unlikely that it has left the breast...and they will rebuild me a lovely new ta-ta that will never droop down to my knees;-). so there's an upside!!!

ok. there it is. crazy, i know. it is incredibly surreal to be typing this--i can't even tell you. a week and a half ago i was in mexico drinking margaritas and surfing with the confidence that all my doctors thought this was nothing to worry about. go figure. for the moment, i am not feeling overly conversant...but i appreciate emails and messages.

i will keep you all posted. we are just in the very beginning of this process and i'm sure I will understand more as we go. for the moment, that's sort of the best i can do on the explanation.

much love.
hol