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Fun stuff, faith helps survivor through busy year
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| Sansone | ||
When Lynn Sansone started 2008, the Warren County resident was looking forward to a busy year.
One of her four daughters was getting married, another would become pregnant, and her youngest would start her senior year that fall at Liberty Christian Academy in Wright City.
"It was all the fun stuff coming," said Sansone, 54, a speech teacher at Daniel Boone Elementary School in Warrenton.
But then she was diagnosed with breast cancer and by March she had surgery to remove a tumor and nine lymph nodes. In April 2008, she started chemotherapy and 33 radiation treatments that would last through August 2008. This past July she finished the last of her medication and began life as a cancer survivor.
In honor of Breast Cancer Awareness Month, the Journal asked Sansone about being a cancer survivor and what she would tell those who are living through similar experiences.
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Q: When you learned about your diagnosis, what was your first thought?
A: It felt like a punch in the gut. That was the initial feeling, and then second was like, what an inconvenience ... and thirdly fear. After I got some education, then the fear rose up.
Q: How did you handle the fear?
A: For me, my husband and I talked it through and decided that we were going to be able to experience it all with the help of Christ. We have a strong faith.
Q: What would you say to someone who is undergoing cancer treatment?
A: I do think you have to look for the bright spots. I'm not thinking like a Pollyanna - I know there's dark, heavy moments and days - but you can't dwell there. People, like strangers would stop me - it's obvious, when they're wearing a scarf and a hat and there's no eyebrows - strangers would stop me on the street and say, "It's been four years for me and there is an end to this." And that was really encouraging for me to hear people say that.
Q: Do you think designating a month to breast cancer awareness is important?
A: I agree that awareness is great, I just wish that we would be aware of so much more. I struggle with that because there are lots of other medical conditions, syndromes that don't get that much attention. ... Even those with different kinds of cancers. I think of myself as fortunate to get breast cancer because all the research that has been done for that. There's lots of (treatment) options for people with breast cancer compared to some of the other cancers. They don't have as many options.
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