Breast Cancer… not me

I come from one of those lucky families with no breast cancer at all. I used to sit in a doctor’s office and casually check the box proclaiming a breast-cancer-free family. I would imagine my sister and eight female first cousins doing the same thing. But all that changed for my entire family in November of 2003. My doctor had ordered me to have my first mammogram in February but I, being certain there was no possibility of a problem, didn’t bother to go until late fall. I figured that sometime in the calendar year would be fine. I went in, got my breasts kneaded and smashed in the giant x-ray machine, went home and thought nothing of it. A week later they called to say I needed a biopsy and still, and I am being completely honest, I was totally calm. Biopsy Shmiopsy! I just kept thinking, “I have NO breast cancer in my family.” After the biopsy, the doctor from the Imaging Center called… not the technician…. telling me I needed to see a specialist. Luckily my OBGYN in New York City knew a breast specialist who was doing amazing things with reconstruction, but still, call it denial, I was perfectly calm.

It took me two weeks to get an appointment and my sister went with me. There was a long wait and finally Blake had to leave. Again without a care, I sat alone in that waiting room filled with very serious people holding hands. Call me the queen of denial, but I sailed into the exam room with my breast-cancer-free-family mantra running through my mind. All that changed when my doctor did a sonogram and found the telltale uneven borders on my tumor. She said that if I had any plans tomorrow I should cancel them because she needed to do a lumpectomy immediately! It had taken me 14 days to get in to see her, and suddenly she could operate on me the next day? For the first time I was completely and utterly scared.

There are moments in your life when you realize how lucky you are to have married just the right person. I had one that night. My husband told me that if I had to lose my left breast he would make certain they gave me two really big ones in exchange. We laughed so hard we fell down, and to this day it always makes me smile.

The surgery was fast and instead of cancer, I got a syndrome and a scar. The tumor had a marker giving me a 75% chance of getting cancer in either breast. I see my specialist every three months and get my yearly mammogram. Truthfully, I don’t think about it too often, but when Elizabeth Edwards announced that her cancer had returned, I felt lightheaded for a moment and also profoundly sad for her and her family. I thought about the thousands of women diagnosed with breast cancer each year and about all their sisters, cousins, and daughters who now have to check the breast cancer box like me and my family.

Wicked Step-Mom????

Andrew Giuliani recently admitted to the NY Times and a few other publications that since his father remarried, things have been strained between them. He said that while he thought his Dad would make a great President, he would not be hitting the campaign trail. He also said his father missed his high school graduation, some important events of his sister's and that much of it was since his father’s new wife had entered the scene. These comments brought about a rash of articles about blended families and how second marriages are even less likely to succeed than first ones…. which are already in a pretty tenuous state. Needless to say, I read all of this with great intensity. As a step mom, these types of stories make me wake up in a cold sweat. Now let’s be honest, stepmothers get a bad rap. Cinderella’s stepmother dressed her in rags and made her clean house. She was kind compared to Snow White’s step mom who tried to have her killed on two separate occasions, once by a hit man (aka the woodsman) and another by poisoning.

Navigating the world of step-parenting is difficult at best because you always walk the thin line between being a friend and an authority figure. I remember a time early in my relationship with my now husband. We had been dating for a couple of years so I knew both of his boys pretty well and they were in Manhattan spending the weekend with Michael. He had to work for a few hours so I was hanging out with them until he finished. We were playing cards and they started playing war which is the card game that often dissolves into cards being fired all over the house. I am always worried about being the bad guy, so pretty soon there were cards everywhere, the boys were running around screaming and I was freaking out because they were starting to fight with pillows and I knew I had to say something. I was so worried about being their friend that I dreaded saying anything. But like all children, they were waiting for me to set some boundaries. I used this line for the first time then but it continues to work to this day… “Is this the kind of behavior your Dad would be ok with?” This usually stops a problem cold. I was faced with another issue a few years later. Everett wanted to play a video game and Michael had gone out to run. Now I knew Michael had said he had been on the computer too long but I wanted to be the fun-loving “cool” step mom. I came to my senses when this young boy looked at me devilishly and said, “I know, let’s just not tell him." Later I was happy with how I handled it… I told Ev he could play the game but when his Dad got back we would tell him about it. It was a good solution and it kept me from lying to my husband as well as on good terms with Everett.

Hal Runkel author of “Scream Free Parenting” was on “iVillage Live” on Monday. We were chatting and I told him about our blended family. He looked at me and said, “AHH, a wicked stepmother.” I looked shocked and he said all stepmother’s are wicked because they can never be what the kids want ..their real Mother. He told me the key was to "just let the relationship be … don’t try too hard." Work on being the best person you can be and hopefully, in the end, that will be enough …..even for a wicked stepmother.

Ski trip

I have spent the last four days on a wonderful vacation in Montana skiing with my family. I am sure a lot of you wonder at my choice, thinking that a few days lying on a beach would be a lot more relaxing. But in this case our time spent flying down the mountains were perfect. My whole family was together, guests of my incredibly generous sister and brother in law who have a beautiful house in the mountains. I was especially glad to spend time with my sister, Blake, who is my best friend and lives in London. I miss her every day and hanging out with her was definitely good for my soul. Any one with a sister knows that if you are close there is no relationship like it.

Now, I am not the greatest skier, but I truly love it and what I lack in style I make up for in enthusiasm. My husband, Michael, is one of those beautiful skiers who literally make the sport look like an art form. I love skiing with him because he has a way of making me feel confident and adventurous, allowing me to venture into much more difficult terrain than I ever would on my own. This has led us into some problems. I remember an afternoon in Canada when I stood in my skis on top of a very steep slope in the middle of what seemed like a blizzard crying that we were going to die and my husband responding with the very male statement, “There is no crying in skiing”. Strangely enough this shut me up long enough for us to get down the mountain.

I have always dreamed that my daughter would take after Michael in the athletic department. She is five and started going to ski school when she was three. Now truthfully on the last two trips I thought her skiing was sadly going to resemble mine with lots of concerns about heights and complaints about painful ski boots. But this trip it all came together for her and she started to love the feel and excitement of the snow and wind. She spent her time turning her skis into French fries (straight) and pizza (pointed together to stop). Ever the un-cool Mom, I spent a lot of my vacation skiing behind her class surreptitiously watching her, beaming when she did something right and horrified when she fell. I blew my cover twice when she went down … my excuse was that I didn’t want to make her teacher climb back up the mountain when I was actually just a few yards away. Truthfully I just wanted to make sure she was OK. Because, after all, no matter how big they get, they are still our babies. Life really is a great big circle because I know my Mom still feels that way about me. Late one afternoon, she was watching me ski home and I caught the edge of my ski and fell down very ungracefully and hard. I saw her cringe and knew it was all she could do not to rush to me, her baby, who tops her by about six inches and is way, way, way, way past childhood.

As a parent I think there are these “ah ha” moments that crystallize the changes in our children. We always wonder "when did they get so big", but every once in a while you see them grow up right in front of you like the first time I saw my oldest step-son drive our car. I had one of those moments with Charlotte on this trip. It was late in the day and we ran into her on top of the mountain going to get cookies and hot chocolate with her class. My husband and I were excited to see her and immediately yelled hello. Usually at this point she would run to us for hugs, but instead she glanced over, looked back at her friends muttered, ”Hi” and headed off with her group. My sister said, “Did she just diss us?” We laughed and realized that yeah …. She did. AAAAAAHHHHH!!!! They grow up way too fast.

A library card for Charlotte

Today was a momentous day in our household because my 5-year-old daughter got her first library card. She had to sign her name and then excitedly realized she could check out as many books as she wanted. She decided nine was the perfect amount. My husband was with her and she wouldn’t leave the library until she had read at least one of the new books.

My husband made the mistake of including “Life of Pi” in the books he checked out. I glanced through it, read the first page and unfortunately it really grabbed me. Now I know this probably sounds strange because what is better than finding a good book? The truth is I absolutely love to read but I am very good at blocking out people when I am immersed in a good story. Needless to say, this ability to focus solely on what I am reading drives my husband crazy. When I was in elementary school and middle school, when asked what I liked to do most, I would always say “read.” I loved entering another world created by a writer and even as a young child I remember being completely moved by books. In the fifth grade I sobbed for hours over the plight of Sara in “A Little Princess” by Frances Hodgson Burnett. It was a good kind of sad and I love the fact that books have always moved me.

I am sure that many of the Moms reading this are thinking, “How does she have time to read?” The truth is, since having my daughter and having my stepsons for weekends, books have become very few and far between. I started reading more magazines with shorter stories. The New Yorker is great for that because I can carry it around all week and read the articles and short stories in waiting rooms or during my daughter’s ballet class.

My stepsons are great readers and their Mom periodically declares “no Screen” days where no TV’s or computers are allowed, but you can read as much as you want. I remember when one of the new Harry Potter books came out, my husband and I stayed up until midnight to get one of the first copies. Michael was thrilled to see how psyched the boys were over a new book. After noticing a lot of adults in the bookstore lines, we both read J.K Rowling’s amazing books and soon realized what all the fuss was about. We will get our own copies at midnight, as well as one for the kids, when the latest installment is released. Both boys are great students and we know this has a lot to do with their love of the printed word.

Charlotte is just learning to read and it is wonderful to see her thrill over successfully sounding out sentences in her easy-reading books. I want to instill in her the love of reading but I am afraid that if I push her, she will get turned off. So for now, we read books each night and hope the library card will continue to inspire. Currently, her favorites are the Beatrice Potter books and each night we cuddle up in her bed and read. These are some of the nicest moments I experience as a Mom. I think “…am I getting teary over the antics of Peter Rabbit or perhaps from this intense love I feel for this small person listening with such enthusiasm?” It is probably a little of both.

Here are some of my favorite books. Let me know some that you like too.

Wild Swans …Chang
Poisonwood Bible…. Kingsolver
Guns Germs & Steel… Diamond
Brave New World … Huxley
Little Women…. Alcott
Exodus….Uris
The Source… Mitchner
Little House Books… Wilder

Catfood for thought

We have two beloved cats, Kit and Black Jack, and I just found out that I have been feeding them food that could kill them. Two days ago my Mom and I were reading the paper and she started reading aloud an article … now honestly this usually annoys me, but it was about people losing their pets to some odd illness, so I started to listen. We learned that the sickness was kidney failure and that it was caused by tainted food. Then she said that there was a recall. Now I have heard about countless recalls and I always check the can or package and invariably find that we don’t have the serial number… but this time things were different. Like so many Americans, I found out that what I thought were Max Cat and Natural Choice were really Nutro Products. We were very calm at first and then furious when we realized the chunks of meat in gravy that our cats loved was actually full of contaminated wheat gluten. The thing that made us the craziest was that it was ALL the food. We kept thinking we could check the little pouches for some kind of date or number or factory but there was nothing. I took the food back to our neighborhood pet store and they were awesome. They immediately gave us a refund and said it was a serious situation and to keep a close eye on both animals. The good news is that even though Kit has a rash and has been a little lethargic our vet said she is fine. He told us they’d already had a case of renal failure in our local clinic and that there was a big fear that the number of animals affected is actually much higher than has been reported.

My thoughts are with pet owners who have not been as lucky as my family and I am sure many of you wonder if this horrible situation could have been prevented. I also wonder if a lot of people were as surprised as I was to find out that the so-called high-end pet food I was feeding my animals was the exact same food found in every can or package no matter what the name. There’s a famous line often attributed to PT Barnun which goes, “There’s a sucker born every minute.” I guess in my case he was absolutely right.

The perfect mommy/daughter moment… NOT

I always imagine these Norman Rockwell moments with my kids when I am the perfect, patient, organized Mom and my children look at me with rapt attention as I impart wonderful bits of wit and wisdom. Unfortunately, real life never really lives up to my dreams and I was reminded of this a few days ago.

Naamua Delaney, one of the other hosts of iVillage Live, was having a birthday and I volunteered to bring the cake. I had worked late the day before and was feeling very guilty and my five-year-old was giving me those soulful looks that scream, “My Mommy likes her job more than me.” I realized that the cake could create some excellent “quality time” so instead of buying a cake at a bakery, we would bake one. Perfect! We went to the grocery store and picked out a mix… yes, when I say bake I mean a box and a couple of eggs, the perfect frosting (in a can) and several tubes of icing to create the multitude of flowers she wanted on the cake. We were talking and laughing and I was very pleased with my idea and feeling so good about my parenting skills. I promised that this would be her cake to make and decorate and really, that is how it all began. She pulled her stool up to the counter and poured in the powder batter, oil, water and eggs. She was stirring and laughing and I let her lick the spoon before the eggs went in, of course, so that my precious baby would not be exposed to the salmonella lurking in the eggs that I had eaten without difficulty my entire childhood. Oh yes, we moms today must be far more vigilant than our own mothers.

We greased the pan and things were still Betty Crocker beautiful. We popped the cake in the oven and hugged. After the requisite 35 minutes, we tested our cake with a toothpick and it was fluffy and light. Now unfortunately, I tend to be impatient and the time when a cake is cooling always seems like a waste to me. I decided to move things along, but when I flipped it carefully out of the pan, it was suddenly in three pieces. At this point I am starting to stress and the small child asking, “Mommy, why do we want the cake broken?” is not helping. I am starting to see my co-workers saying, “Man, is that Molly a lousy cook.”

I managed to reassemble the cake like a jigsaw puzzle and decided that perhaps we should leave it for a while to cool… better late than never. While we were gone, either my dad or one of the cats ate two sizable bites out of the cake. I personally believe it was my father but when I started screaming, he said it was the cat. Seriously, I have never seen a cat eat chocolate cake, but my Dad said that was his story and he was sticking to it. There was no time to make another cake so we decided the frosting would hide all problems and I wouldn’t tell anyone about the possible feline disaster. I am now semi-freaking out, ready for this cake to just go away, and furious that Naamua’s mother gave birth to her on this day. It is at this point that my daughter grabs a knife and brushes the white frosting through the black cake pulling up tiny bits of cake and making a mess.

My beautiful bonding moment is down the tubes as I scream, “NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO Mom will frost the cake.” All I needed was a coat hanger in my hand and the “Mommy Dearest” moment would have been complete. I suddenly realized that this was one of those crystallizing moments where priorities MUST be addressed. In the end, I took a deep breath, put my pride aside and let my five-year-old decide the decorations. The cake had too many flowers and lots of black spots of frosting, but my daughter was smiling and I learned, somewhat belatedly, that I would rather try to be a good Mom than a good baker.

Sometimes, in the middle of the night...

My daughter Charlotte was born with a face only a mother could love. I was in labor for 36 hours and she weighed 9 1/2 lbs., so by the time she came out, one side of her face was easily an inch higher than the other. I remember looking at her thinking… well she has beautiful ears. My husband and I loved her on sight, it just wasn't such a pretty one. My friends say I exaggerate the lop-sidedness of her features but then I show them the pictures and they say “wow, she looks a lot better now.”

My husband has two sons from his first marriage so, to me, he was a god in the parenting department. It is kind of a wonderful dynamic because most of my friends barely let their partner touch the new child. I, on the other hand, would cry tears of joy when he looked at that horrible purple shriveled thing hanging from what was supposed to be her belly button and nod approvingly. “This looks great.” He would lay her out on her towel, bathe her and say, “It’s just like washing a chicken,” and I would think I will do anything to keep him happy.

Charlotte is 5 years old now but the memories came pouring back last night because one of my dearest friends just had her first baby. Tena called me saying, “I love her more than my own life but sometimes, late at night, I wish she would disappear. I feel so guilty.” At first, her words shocked me, and then…. I remembered …. It was 3:30 AM and I was leaning so far over the crib that the railing was cutting off the circulation to my arm. I’d told myself I would pat her 1000 times and then, and only then, try to step back. After the endless, mind-numbing counting, I slowed the cadence until I thought, “It’s asleep”. Then, with the quiet focus of a skilled hunter, I would back away, giddy in my success until… my foot kicked a random toy on the floor and suddenly, “Elmo want to be a chicken, Elmo want to be a duck”, echoed throughout our apartment. I’d freeze and my mind would scream NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO and then the telltale intake of breath as the devil baby realized I had the audacity to stop patting her. I thought oh yes, I remember those nights and “disappear” is a nice way of putting it.

So, to my dear friend Tena and all the other new Mom's out there, don't feel guilty! We always love our babies, but sometimes, in the middle of the night, we hate them… just a little.