Saturday, September 24, 2011

I'm Feeling More Vulnerable


Monday January 13, 1992

We're a little tired and depressed today, probably from the movie. Frank walks to the shopping center and buys two magazines with articles about ovarian cancer which we read. I guess I'm feeling more vulnerable than usual today with such bad news about ovarian cancer. We go to lunch at Carl's Jr.

After dinner we attend a general meeting of our club before the class dance. We are elected to Sheriff and we volunteer to a couple of other jobs. Now we must attend board meetings every month.

We dance two hours with the class and come home.

Mom knew her prognosis was poor from the moment she was diagnosed. I remember her telling me her chances of surviving 5 years was 15%. She rejected those statistics for herself though, believing in prayer and the power of a positive attitude. This is the first time I have seen doubt creep into her journal. Even today, 20 years later, the death rate from ovarian cancer is very high. Great strides have been made in lowering the death rate in breast cancer because of better screening and early detection. With ovarian cancer, there is no screening for early detection and there are no symptoms early in the disease. Most ovarian cancers are discovered after the cancer has metastasized to other parts of the body, as was the case with Mom.

No comments:

Post a Comment