Something Unbelievable #7

I just need to think about something else... so I decided to review the "Why my life is unbelievable" post (from the November Archives) and write about whatever I had listed as #7.

#7) At 35, I shaved my head completely bald (or rather, my children cut off my ponytails and my husband took a razor to my scalp) the same week my aunt began chemotherapy for stage IV breast cancer.

One afternoon in late 2003, I received a phone call from my mom telling me that one of her two sisters had been diagnosed with Stage IV breast cancer. I didn't grow up living near either of them, so while I felt like I didn't know them very well, I always felt a strong connection to them every time we were together. Not a visit went by that didn't leave me feeling encouraged and valued.

One of my aunts married and had her three children young...two girls and a boy, just like me, so I was always able to bond with her over the perils of parenting. She is a sharp, intelligent woman, still in love with the same man after like a million years, and she is always so positive and cheery, you pretty much can't hang around her for long and not feel pretty perky yourself.

And then there's my sweet Aunt Mary...an angel in disguise for sure. She married later in life, and she and her husband were content to have dogs (a lot of them...) Growing up, she was almost an enigma to me... kind of mysterious, out there... different than the other 2 girls in her family. As I became an adult, I began to appreciate Aunt Mary's "different-ness" more and more. She didn't do what everyone told her to do, and she didn't try to change herself to meet some societal or familial expectation. She is and was her OWN person. She always seemed to me to be really STRONG... in mind, spirit and body. She rode horses (that smelled), lived in the mountains (far away), loved the outdoors (that were dirty), let the dogs kiss her on the mouth (eeewwwww), and it had long been rumored that she had shed her traditional Episcopal upbringing and (shhhh) joined a "cult". To me at 20, that was about as free-thinking, high-spirited and rebellious as you could get. She AMAZED me... she intrigued me... she INSPIRED me. And so the phone call rocked me to my core.

Over the next few weeks, my mom would occassionally express some of the family's thoughts and fears about Aunt Mary's treatment. I was surprised to hear that Aunt Mary was REALLY concerned about losing her hair from the chemotherapy. I remember asking my mom why? "WHY?!" she said... like I was a dope. As if that small price for her health WAS a really big deal. While I've never been through chemotherapy myself, I'm married to a survivor who has, and I thought the hair thing should have been the least of their worries. After all... isn't it only hair? Dead cells that our body is shedding anyway? Surely this limit-testing, brave woman knew that she was NOT defined by her hair. Her hair had nothing to do with who she was as a person, what she was capable of, or even how beautiful she appeared to the rest of the world. It was all so crystal clear to me, why didn't she see it too?

It didn't matter. She (and her family) had very real concerns about her losing her hair. I sympathized, tried to understand, imagined myself in her place and then it hit me. When she began her treatment I would shave my head. And I did.

I didn't tell anyone on that side of my family beforehand because I didn't want to deal with the campaign to stop it from happening. At a time when I felt totally helpless, unable to do anything more than pray, I could do this. So I did.

And for the record, it WASN'T pretty. Being bald emphasized my triple chin and revealed more than one giant ugly mole on my scalp. Skin that has never seen one single drop of sun is not attractive either. It's weird. And it's really cold if you decide to be bald in February. During the growing out process people either assumed I was sick myself or gay. It was very uncomfortable to be looked at with pity or piety depending on what people were thinking. I saw parents of kids at school, coaches, people I had met at scrapbooking events. They would visibly jerk when they realized they KNEW that strange-looking lady (she is a "woman" right, not a fat guy in drag?) At last I grasped what all Mary's anxiety was about. All stared, some asked. And I told.

Told them about my wonderful Aunt Mary and her fight against breast cancer. I sent an email with a photo of myself to 125 women in my address book entitled "To My Friends With Breasts..." encouraging mammograms and breast self-exams. I donated my paltry 9 inches of hair to "Locks of Love" who make wigs for people experiencing medical hair loss (http://www.locksoflove.org/). Hopefully it made a difference to someone I knew. But all that mattered to me was that Mary finally understood that it was ONLY hair. Her heart is who she is. And I loved her whole heart with every strand of hair on my head.

When I went for a visit 2 months after the shearing, I only needed the total expression of tenderness and affection in Aunt Mary's eyes as she put her hands up into the soft quarter-inch growth on my head. Her eyes sparkled with tears and she said, "Oh honey, I love you so much." It is a moment I will cherish for the rest of my life.

She starts a new round of chemo soon. I think it is her 3rd or 4th round. At Christmas she had been doing well for about 5 months. Then one day, the markers in her blood came back indicating her illness was rearing its ugly head again. She points out that her cancer is after all, Stage IV. You don't ever get ALL the way better from Stage IV. You live on borrowed time. But don't we all?

Isn't every day one you didn't know for sure you'd get when you went to sleep the night before? Doesn't the Bible tell us that God knows all of us so well that even the hairs on our head our numbered? If God really knows every star in the sky by name, don't we have to trust Him with everything?

God has used Aunt Mary to teach me an important lesson about love, life, illness, perserverence, determination, the fragility of our bodies and the strength of our spirits. God has used Aunt Mary to teach me about Him.

Lord, thank you for Aunt Mary. Thank you for bringing me to a family that had Aunt Mary in it. Thank you for each day we've had to get to know each other a little better. Thank you for her kindness and the sound of her laugh. Help me to behave as if I'm living on borrowed time...Your time. Give me the strength of character to make good use of it. Amen