October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month, so I guess this is the perfect time for me to share this hopeful, albeit different, perspective on the disease. I was only 36 when I was diagnosed with 9/12 positive lymph nodes and a tumor that was 2.5 cm in size. Initially, the outlook was not good. My diagnosis and treatment had been delayed by a lack of concern over the lump in my breast and lumps under my arm. After all, at 35, and then even at 36, I was too young for breast cancer.

It took a very dedicated female physician to finally feel the lump in my breast and lumps under my arm at my request, take me seriously, and send me to surgery. (I had already had one needle biopsy that missed the tumor.) The results were startling, to say the least.

I knew something was wrong, but never expected that it could be soooo wrong. My breast cancer was estrogen positive and very aggressive, according to the doctors. My first surgeon told me he wished he could give me hope, but didn't feel right about doing so. Wow! I was floored.

My diagnosis almost immediately followed the signing of my first full time teaching contact. It was with a heavy heart that I withdrew from the contract to teach in Selawik, Alaska, a very rural village. I had really thought that I was going to make a career out of teaching in the Alaskan Bush. Suddenly, I was faced with the possibility that I would never have a career.

My son (eight years old at the time) and I moved from Soldotna, Alaska, to Buffalo, NY, for a year. I started treatment at Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Institute. My husband commuted from Alaska to New York about once a month. His job with an oil company on the North Slope was a work two weeks on site, take two weeks off situation that allowed him to do so.

After undergoing a clinical trial which involved a lumpectomy, high dose chemotherapy, growth colony factor injections, and radiation, I was ready to return home. I was not ready to work, however; at least not, in a classroom. My husband and I bought a new computer and hooked it up to the internet. The idea behind this purchase was solely to find something to keep me from getting too bored while my son was in school and my husband was away at work.

I started writing. I found web sites that needed content. Soon, I was getting paid for writing. I wrote constantly.

I remembered being a little girl and telling people that I was going to be a writer when I grew up. I also remembered giving that dream up, focusing on a teaching degree, becoming more realistic. I never once thought that having a disease, like breast cancer, would be the catalyst that caused me to pursue that childhood dream once more.

I am three years out from my breast cancer diagnosis. My hair is back. My check ups have been good. My writing career? It's taken off!

Since the summer of 2000, when I returned home, I have written and sold 12 nonfiction children's books. You can look me up on amazon.com or Barnes and Noble. I have ISBN numbers! You can purchase my e-book, How to Break into Educational Freelance Writing at
Take a look at my new E-book at:
http://www.dreamjobstogo.com/titles/djtg0071.html?11198
Shameless Plug? Yes, told you, I AM A WRITER!


I recently took on the bellaonline breast cancer site. It doesn't pay me anything, but it serves other women and helps me to give a little something back to other breast cancer patients

Did breast cancer cause my life to change? You bet it did! The gift that breast cancer gave me is one that I will cherish forever. I truly understand now that you never know how much time you may have, so it's of utmost importance to pursue your dreams and to tell your loved ones how much they mean to you every day. Breast Cancer, for me, was a blessing in many ways.

Funny how life's paths can lead us away from our dreams, isn't it? Then, we fall, or get lost, and when we get up or find ourselves, we see that we are right where we were supposed to be, all the time. I am a writer. It took breast cancer to help me remember that.

So, I say to all breast cancer patients and survivors out there.....don't give up! Follow your hearts and your dreams. Pursue your passions and believe in yourselves. We are beautiful. We are strong. We have the hearts of lionesses. We can make a difference in our own lives and in the lives of others!