By Hilary Locker Fussteig
Well, there she finally was. For anyone living under a rock, Kate Middleton—wan, terrified, skinny jeans loose on her legs—told the world that she has cancer. Everyone I know teared up when they watched the announcement. Same here. Yet I haven’t stopped thinking about it since.
Nine years ago, when my kids were the same ages as Prince George and Princess Charlotte, I found out I had breast cancer. My husband and I came home from my doctor’s office, and I promptly sent him upstairs to our boys and their after-school sitter while I attempted to collect myself in our building’s lobby before facing them. How do you tell young children that you may die? As it turns out, you don’t. At least not until you have to. I called a child psychologist I knew, who advised me in no uncertain terms to tell them I would be fine—even without having a pathology report or a prognosis at that point in the process. I felt it might be a boldface lie, but I texted my husband with this information, wiped my tear-soaked face, and ventured upstairs to make my first Cancer Announcement.
We are all remarkably proficient at sharing news of engagements, weddings, births, promotions, and other joyous events. There are printed announcements, social media, over-the-top gender reveals, and festive gatherings. The royal family, of course, spreads the word like nobody else. Remember, when Prince George was born, the Town Crier on the hospital steps, the golden easel placed at Buckingham Palace, the 41-gun salute?
There’s no protocol for sharing that one has a life-threatening illness. Not among the Royals, and not among those of us leading more conventional lives.
My heart cracked for Kate, knowing how wrenching it is to let the cancer cat out of the bag. Here is a fit, vibrant young mother breaking to the world that she has a serious disease. Cue the pity and the prayers, which in some ways make things worse before better. After I told my own kids, I disclosed my situation to a few close relatives and friends, mostly via e-mail, because I simply couldn’t confront them live. Too hot to touch. I knew I would break down, and I was someone who had always been guarded about drama. I come from an emotionally stoic family, where I learned to keep a stiff upper lip and hold any less than stellar news close to the vest. Watching Kate’s video brought the pain of all my announcements back.
But it also reminded me of how far I’ve come since.
Gradually in those early days, I e-mailed everyone I knew. “Some News,” was always my subject line. “I have been diagnosed with breast cancer,” and all the rest (I’m having a mastectomy, not sure yet about chemo or radiation, etc). After close friends and family came the moms from my kids’ schools, in small groups, titrated each day. The e-mail replies whooshed back. “We are here for you.” “You’ve got this.” “Can I pick your kids up and bring them over for dinner next week?” “Sending so much love.” “I am right here.” Even now, tears drip to my keyboard as the memories of warmth and empathy that engulfed me then flood me all over again.
A close friend took the helm and created a schedule of who would drop off dinners, who was available to do grocery or drug store runs, and who could handle school pickups. Based on her own experience with surgery, she also let my friends and family know what time my operation was; they were to envision me wrapped in a pink blanket while sending love, calm, and warm thoughts at exactly that time frame. She told me I needed to picture myself in that blanket at that same time for this to work. It sounded a little woo woo, but when you have cancer, woo woo is welcome. I felt that collective blanket—physically felt it—and I knew as certainly as I’ve known anything, that energy heals.
When chemo came, I just couldn’t hide. A wig is a wig is a wig, no matter how masterful the lacy front may be. Now everyone would take one look at me and know. If this felt like too much for me, I can only imagine how the Princess of Wales, one of the most stunning and most photographed women in the world, will handle this scrutiny.
My own privacy barriers broke. As a stranger in a supermarket checkout line told me “I had it too, and it’s been ten years,” as I called upon a neighbor to run to CVS because I needed betadine for my surgical incision, the walls came down and wings came up. So many people were lifting me that sometimes I felt genuinely high on love.
In the ensuing years, I started writing and publishing essays about my cancer, or even just tangentially about cancer, for anyone to see. I wrote about my forever bond with those who sat with me during chemo, planning for an iffy future during quarantine being akin to planning with a cancer diagnosis—both leaps of faith, a crazy habit I developed after treatment of running into the street to stop traffic so that ambulances could get by.
A friend who went through breast cancer together with me (same hospital, same surgeon, same chemo) grabbed her cancer by the horns and immediately started raising awareness and funds and traveling to speak at conferences. A year after treatment she won the Susan B. Komen Impact Award, and she recently launched My Cancer Family, an organization that supports cancer patients, their families, and caregivers. Finally somewhat out of my shell, I gave her permission to use a quote of mine on her new website, though anonymously, as it was about therapy during treatment. And then—wait for it—I gave my blessing to my 17-year-old son to start a national support group for teens with a parent who has cancer, which he did. I think I got the memo. Wonderful things can happen—for ourselves and others—if we let our guards down and people in. It’s a loop of good.
As Kate Middleton processes her situation, shepherds her children through this wilderness, and eventually emerges on the other side, she will be embattled, but I also hope she will be emboldened. She has an almost unparalleled platform to raise awareness. If she discloses nothing else than the type of cancer she has and how to detect it early, she will save who knows how many lives.
Cancer never leaves a person. Not really. Surgeons can excise a tumor, delivering totally clean margins, yet there’s a long trail—not just the simmering possibility of recurrence, but the permanence of having been there, done that. We patients and survivors are an alumni association of sorts. We’re used to being asked, years on, “How are you feeling?” and “You okay?” when we are totally fine and cancer had not been top, or even bottom, of mind just then. We are The Ones Who Had Cancer.
As long I have a lifetime membership, I’m going to avail myself of all the benefits I can take and give.
Hilary Locker Fussteig is a writer and former magazine editor. She lives in New York City with her husband and two teenage sons. For information on the support group her 17-year-old has established, please click here.
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