Marcy Borders 'The Dust Lady' of 9/11 dies of stomach cancer

Marcy Borders 'The Dust Lady' of 9/11 dies of stomach cancer
New Jersey banker whose shell-shocked and dust-covered figure became one of the lasting images of the September 11 attacks, dies age 42

By Harriet Alexander 9:42AM BST 26 Aug 2015

An American woman whose traumatised, dust-covered face summed up the horrors of the September 11 attacks has died of stomach cancer at the age of 42.
Marcy Borders, known as "The Dust Lady" thanks to the photograph taken in the immediate aftermath, became one of the most recognisable survivors. She had started work at Bank of America a month before the attack, and was working on the 81st floor of World Trade Centre when the first plane hit.

She managed to make it down to the ground level, and was walking away when the second plane struck the tower, leaving her covered from head to foot in thick grey dust.
In the years that followed the mother of two fell into a spiral of drink, drugs and depression, which saw her rack up huge debts and have her children taken into care.
"I just couldn’t cope," she told The Telegraph in 2011, to mark the 10-year anniversary of the attacks. "The alcohol made me numb, the drugs got me high.
"Every time I saw an airplane, I thought there would be another attack. I could not get that day out of my mind."
But a decade on, she was finally getting back into the working world and helping with a candidate's local campaign for mayor when, in August 2014, she was diagnosed with stomach cancer.
"I'm saying to myself: 'Did this thing ignite cancer cells in me?'" she said.
"I definitely believe it because I haven't had any illnesses. I don't have high blood pressure, high cholesterol, diabetes."

Announcing the news of her death on Monday evening, her first cousin, John Borders, said his relative died of "the diseases that (have) ridden her body since 9/11".

In the years since 9/11, many hundreds of people caught up in the attacks have been diagnosed with cancer. Figures from July 2014 showed that more than 2,500 police officers, firefighters, ambulance staff and sanitation workers reported they had cancer in 2013 – twice as many as said they had the disease 12 months earlier.
It is unclear how many emergency staff have already died after contracting cancer as a result of their work at Ground Zero.

Doctors said those who spent significant amounts of time at the site are at increased risk of a number of different cancers, including prostate, thyroid, leukaemia and multiple myeloma, after coming into contact with “wildly toxic” dust emitted for months following the World Trade Centre attacks.
Fires at the site burned for three months, releasing carcinogens and other deadly chemicals into the air, while thousands of tonnes of pulverised toxic debris lay strewn at the site of the Towers’ collapse.

The compensation bill for treating those who became ill after helping in the long-running recovery operation at Ground Zero has already run into millions of dollars.
When asked if she ever looked at "The Dust Lady" photo of herself, Ms Borders said she avoided doing so as much as possible.
"I try to take myself from being a victim to being a survivor now," she said. "I don't want to be a victim anymore."

Breast cancer – how to spot the signs and symptoms

Breast cancer – how to spot the signs and symptoms

As TV’s Victoria Derbyshire reveals she has breast cancer and is due to have a mastectomy, the experts explain what to look for.

By Kate Whiting
Last updated: 20 August 2015, 17:45 BST

When Victoria Derbyshire bravely took to Twitter to tell her followers she had been diagnosed with breast cancer, it shone a spotlight on the most common cancer in the UK.

The 46-year-old TV presenter revealed she would be having a mastectomy to treat the disease and would continue to present her current affairs programme “as much as possible in the weeks ahead”.

Breast cancer affects around 55,000 people in the UK each year, according to charity Breast Cancer Care, and of these around 350 are men. Just over 80% of cases are in people aged over 50.

Survival rates are generally good, providing you have spotted the signs early enough. Most women know they should be checking their breasts regularly, but it’s not always obvious what you’re looking for.

“It’s really important that women of all ages check their breasts regularly and get to know what’s normal for them,” says Breast Cancer Care’s senior clinical nurse specialist Rachel Rawson.

“It’s not just about a lump – other symptoms can also be important to spot, such as puckering or dimpling of the skin, a nipple becoming inverted or a constant pain in the breast or armpit.”

How to check your breasts

Checking your breasts doesn’t need to take long. It’s something you can do in the shower or bath, or when you’re applying body lotion or getting dressed – whenever suits you. But remember to check all parts of your breast, your armpits and up to your collarbone.

“Anyone who notices any unusual changes should visit their GP without delay,” says Rawson. “Most breast changes aren’t due to breast cancer, but the sooner breast cancer is diagnosed, the more effective treatment may be.”

For more information, visit www.breastcancercare.org.uk or call for support on 0808 800 6000.

8 signs and symptoms to look for

Breast Cancer Care says this is what to look for when you’re checking your breasts:

1. A change in shape or size

2. Redness or a rash on the skin and/or around the nipple

3. Discharge (liquid) that comes from the nipple without squeezing

4. A swelling in your armpit or around your collarbone

5. A lump or thickening that feels different from the rest of the breast tissue

6. A change in skin texture such as a puckering or dimpling (like orange skin)

7. Your nipple becoming inverted (pulled in) or changing its position or shape

8. Constant pain in your breast or armpit

Bowel cancer: the 5 warning signs you dare not ignore

Bowel cancer: the 5 warning signs you dare not ignore

On Lift The Lid Day, a national bowel cancer charity is urging people to beat the taboo of talking about poo to raise awareness of an illness that kills 16,000 Britons a year.

By Nel Staveley
Last updated: 26 April 2015, 18:02 BST


Looking into the toilet bowl after you’ve been is not the most pleasant of experiences, but knowledge of your poo habits might just save your life.

Bowel cancer is currently the UK's second deadliest cancer, with someone dying of the disease every half an hour. But if it’s caught early it is treatable.

“We know that nine out of 10 cases of bowel cancer can be treated successfully if diagnosed early”, says Mark Flannagan, chief executive of UK charity Beating Bowel Cancer.

Paramount to this early diagnosis is that people are aware of what’s going on with their poo, and that any persistent changes in the normal routine and any signs of blood are checked out immediately.

Don’t be embarrassed

If sufferers can overcome the embarrassment and face the doctor, that is.

“Too few people talk about the disease and sometimes embarrassment can even stop them from getting the help they need,” says Flannagan.

That’s why on April 22, Beating Bowel Cancer has launched Lift the Lid Day, encouraging people not just to lift the toilet lid and have a look, but also to lift the lid on a disease that kills 16,000 people a year.

“We ask people to have as many conversations about bowel cancer as possible,” Flannagan says.

“This will help to lift the taboo surrounding the disease and let everyone knows what symptoms to look out for so they can get them checked out as soon as possible.

“Whether it’s with family, work mates, friends or neighbours – on the phone, face-to-face or online, every conversation counts.”

And to start that conversation, here’s exactly what you need to know about poo and bowel cancer.

Warning sign 1: Stools with blood

Very often, blood in stools is from piles (haemorrhoids), especially if it is bright red, fresh blood – this is because piles are basically swollen veins in the back passage which can easily get damaged when you poo, causing a small amount of bleeding.

But if the blood seems darker, it could be a sign of cancer higher up in the bowel, which has time to go darker as it moves through the bowel. Your stool will be very dark, almost like tar. It could also be bleeding from an ulcer, but either way, you need to see the doctor and get it checked.

Warning sign 2: Looser stools

Everyone can have the odd bout of diarrhoea, from dodgy food, stress or (for women) that time of the month. But if you notice a change to your normal bowel habits that last longer than four to six weeks (though some experts say three), it needs to be checked. This is particularly the case if your stools are looser.

Warning sign 3: More frequent stools

Similar to above, if you notice you’re needing to go a lot more often (and haven’t really changed your diet), it could be an early sign that something’s up.

Warning sign 4: Straining to poo

Constipation, like diarrhoea, is something everyone might have occasionally, but like diarrhoea, if it’s ongoing, you need to aware. Sometimes the cancer tumour can block the bowel, leading to symptoms of intense pains in the abdomen, bloating, being sick, and being constipated.

Warning sign 5: Straining to poo but not actually ‘going’

Sometimes, feeling like you need to go, even though you don’t, can be an early symptom of bowel cancer.

5 other symptoms of bowel cancer

Remember not all these symptoms always mean cancer; and not all people will suffer the same symptoms. If you’re worried, see your doctor immediately.

Losing weight - without dieting, maybe due to having an reduced appetite, or feeling bloated or sick
Pain in your abdomen or back passage - constant or intermittent pain that may be linked to going to the toilet or might come and go
Unexplained tiredness
Breathlessness
Dizziness
For more information on symptoms, or anything else you’re worried about bowel cancer, visit Beating Bowel Cancer.

Cancer and hope

Rachel Stratton
I'm Rachel Stratton, a 17 year old girl and identical twin to Jordyn. On August 9th, 2012 I was diagnosed with brain-stem cancer, (DIPG). I'm an active girl in for a long ride!

WEDNESDAY, JULY 15, 2015

I have come to the conclusion that hope is what we want it and make it to be.

I can't talk, walk and everything between but I can still hope.

It's pretty embarrassing being 20 and having some people look at me different like I'm 2.

The funny thing is when people think I know something but I took 20 years to find out Genovia isn't a real country.Do you really think I know the secret of life?

"I thought a lot today about things inside but I couldn't tell anyone." I wrote, well I have the people around me write in 2 journals each night.
That's what I had written for yesterday. It's true I think a lot-normally but I cant say it. It stinks.

I don't really do anything besides eat and sleep but visitors exhaust me, so I'll update everybody this way.

I'm not doing well but I have a lot of peace. That's what counts I guess.

So I'm still hanging in there. Barely but surely. And I'll keep hanging until I can sew (with energy) again.

Much love

And a big thanks for your love, prayers and kind words--

Rachel

May be the last

May be the last

This may be my last blog post. My health has taken a turn for the worse and I’m in the ‘end of life’ phase now. The chemo was miserable and so I reviewed my decision to continue with more medical interventions and chose not too. I was also too weak to continue with the chemo in a straightforward way. Instead I am on a regime designed to make me comfortable.

I’m quite weak now. I’ve had another wonderful flood of messages from colleagues friends, and relations of caring and loving. There have been some great ones that have recalled times that the person sending the message and I have spent together. One I just received from an old, old friend brought back the kitchen that we decorated in a house that we lived in in the 1980’s where we took lots of time and care over mock malachite and mock lapis lazuli painted units. I loved that kitchen – and hadn’t thought about it for 20 years!

Gill and I also rummaged in the loft and found my nostalgia boxes which included diaries from my year in Kenya in 1978-9. Maybe there is another blog project there – ‘Adam’s year in Kenya’. We still have to discover what else the boxes contain.

Even typing feels like a draining activity now; Gill, my wife, has been helping. Don’t count on me responding to email or skype – which I find a strange thing to say after a quarter century of being assiduous in email correspondence and having short shrift for people who lamely say “I never got the email”.

I’m not sure how to end a post that might or might not be the last. I am at peace. If I have more days with sufficient energy there may be more. Perhaps that is all that is needed.

Adam

Adam died on Saturday 16th May 2015 following a diagnosis of advanced cancer in November 2014. During that time, one of his great pleasures was writing articles for this blog and the range of responses he received.

Which is worse, cancer or depression?

Cancer and depression

Which is worse, cancer or depression? The answer is clear. Depression is worse: depression makes you want to die and cancer doesn’t.

I’ve spent all my adult life with depression lurking. I haven’t mentioned it to very many people at all. For the first ten years I talked about it to nobody at all, for the next decade only Gill and therapists. I have not wanted to be dismissed as a weak and worthless person. But I have been hugely comforted when other people have talked about depression so this blog is me trying to give back. I was inspired by the Norwegian Prime Minister – Prime minister! – who announced in 1998 that he was ill with depression and needed to take some time off, which he did and then returned to complete a successful term in office.

My depression has taken cyclical form with a nine month bout every three years. I worked this out in the late 1990s. It was then possible to start seeing it as a medical issue rather than a personal failing. Then I talked to Gill, saw my GP and started exploring drug and other treatments (I had already tried counseling methods without fully acknowledging that I was ill).

My experience of depression was debilitating, with me being incapable of making any good decisions or getting anything done or caring for other people or even looking after myself, with no glimmer of appetite or joy in life. Thoughts of death rolled and crashed and banged around the door. I spent hours concocting methods of ending my life and discarding them, concocting and discarding, concocting and discarding. Since having children, they have always been, in the end, a definitive reason for discarding.

My depression followed a ‘slowly in, quickly out’ pattern. Over the summer I would start feeling gloomy more and more often and this continued through autumn to blackest days of winter. Some time in spring the first the echo of something I scarcely dared hope for or believe in opened up just for a moment. Once it happened on a bike ride in playing fields in Cambridge; once in the cricket field in front of Firle House, a beautiful Sussex country house, on a day with picnic, children’s games, and our family playing with two others.

One surprising fact for me was that people didn’t notice! I continued turning up at work (never high pressure jobs) and nobody shouted at me for not getting the job done or giving a poor lecture. In home life, Gill and others might not have found me exhilarating company but always invited me along and I usually tagged along, with no true enthusiasm but aware that staying at home would probably be worse. Perhaps they did notice but were just too polite to say. But maybe that is just a very English interpretation!

In the 1990s and 2000s I had two bouts of depression truncated by Prozac type drugs, and then a few months after the depression ended I stopped the drugs, but then the depression came back roughly on schedule. So in 2009 I decided I should be on a drug that was working for me, venlafaxine, for the long term.

After five years depression free, I wanted to see if I’d escaped the cycle and was depression-free without drugs. I didn’t take doctor’s advice. I came off the drugs and within three months the first intimations of gloom appeared. I went back on the drugs but they didn’t help. By last summer I was back in the grips of depression. Also last summer my stomach started hurting persistently which I interpreted as a symptom of the depression, or vice versa. I had a first series of medical check ups in September 2014 but there was no evidence of cancer. It seemed at the time that irritable bowel syndrome was the most likely analysis although it didn’t account for the level or consistency of the stomach pain.

The second set of check ups at the beginning of November included a CT scan and blood tests and it was then that the doctors diagnosed cancer.

And at that point the depression disappeared! Simply evaporated! Was no longer! Apart from terrifying moments in the middle of two dystopian waking dreams following the start of my second chemo a couple of weeks ago, it has not been back (touch wood, fingers crossed).

Depression detached me from the usual trade offs in life: with no appetite for anything, all my choices to do things felt sham. Cancer has returned me to a place where I can take decisions between pleasure and pain, good and bad, in an ordinary way. It has made me more normal and connected with other people. While having cancer I’ve had lots of enjoyable times (like now lazing in a hot deep bath, dictating to Gill in a thoroughly stately manner).

IMG_1296The trade-off is, I die.

Complicated note re responses

I can’t guarantee that I will read anything you write in response because I might die first. But my priority will be to read blog comments (use the button bottom right which appears when you mouse over it). If you want to keep your comment private please send it by email, though I will only read that as second priority.

If you have pictures to attach that would be great, and it would be best if you could attach them to a comment.

Until recently, if you posted a comment, you would not get an alert if there was a response to that comment – so it wasn’t a viable way for me to respond to you. We think we have fixed that now, though if you don’t get an alert, please let support@sketchengine.co.uk know.

The last post

The last post

By Derek on May 4, 2011 7:51 AM

Here it is. I'm dead, and this is my last post to my blog. In advance, I asked that once my body finally shut down from the punishments of my cancer, then my family and friends publish this prepared message I wrote—the first part of the process of turning this from an active website to an archive.

If you knew me at all in real life, you probably heard the news already from another source, but however you found out, consider this a confirmation: I was born on June 30, 1969 in Vancouver, Canada, and I died in Burnaby on May 3, 2011, age 41, of complications from stage 4 metastatic colorectal cancer. We all knew this was coming.

That includes my family and friends, and my parents Hilkka and Juergen Karl. My daughters Lauren, age 11, and Marina, who's 13, have known as much as we could tell them since I first found I had cancer. It's become part of their lives, alas.

Airdrie
Of course it includes my wife Airdrie (née Hislop). Both born in Metro Vancouver, we graduated from different high schools in 1986 and studied Biology at UBC, where we met in '88. At a summer job working as park naturalists that year, I flipped the canoe Air and I were paddling and we had to push it to shore.

We shared some classes, then lost touch. But a few years later, in 1994, I was still working on campus. Airdrie spotted my name and wrote me a letter—yes! paper!—and eventually (I was trying to be a full-time musician, so chaos was about) I wrote her back. From such seeds a garden blooms: it was March '94, and by August '95 we were married. I have never had second thoughts, because we have always been good together, through worse and bad and good and great.

However, I didn't think our time together would be so short: 23 years from our first meeting (at Kanaka Creek Regional Park, I'm pretty sure) until I died? Not enough. Not nearly enough.

What was at the end
I haven't gone to a better place, or a worse one. I haven't gone anyplace, because Derek doesn't exist anymore. As soon as my body stopped functioning, and the neurons in my brain ceased firing, I made a remarkable transformation: from a living organism to a corpse, like a flower or a mouse that didn't make it through a particularly frosty night. The evidence is clear that once I died, it was over.

So I was unafraid of death—of the moment itself—and of what came afterwards, which was (and is) nothing. As I did all along, I remained somewhat afraid of the process of dying, of increasing weakness and fatigue, of pain, of becoming less and less of myself as I got there. I was lucky that my mental faculties were mostly unaffected over the months and years before the end, and there was no sign of cancer in my brain—as far as I or anyone else knew.

As a kid, when I first learned enough subtraction, I figured out how old I would be in the momentous year 2000. The answer was 31, which seemed pretty old. Indeed, by the time I was 31 I was married and had two daughters, and I was working as a technical writer and web guy in the computer industry. Pretty grown up, I guess.

Yet there was much more to come. I had yet to start this blog, which recently turned 10 years old. I wasn't yet back playing drums with my band, nor was I a podcaster (since there was no podcasting, nor an iPod for that matter). In techie land, Google was fresh and new, Apple remained "beleaguered," Microsoft was large and in charge, and Facebook and Twitter were several years from existing at all. The Mars rovers Spirit and Opportunity were three years away from launch, while the Cassini-Huygens probe was not quite half-way to Saturn. The human genome hadn't quite been mapped yet.

The World Trade Center towers still stood in New York City. Jean Chrétien remained Prime Minister of Canada, Bill Clinton President of the U.S.A., and Tony Blair Prime Minister of the U.K.—while Saddam Hussein, Hosni Mubarak, Kim Jong-Il, Ben Ali, and Moammar Qaddafi held power in Iraq, Egypt, North Korea, Tunisia, and Libya.

In my family in 2000, my cousin wouldn't have a baby for another four years. My other cousin was early in her relationship with the man who is now her husband. Sonia, with whom my mother had been lifelong friends (ever since they were both nine), was still alive. So was my Oma, my father's mom, who was then 90 years old. Neither my wife nor I had ever needed long-term hospitalization—not yet. Neither of our children was out of diapers, let alone taking photographs, writing stories, riding bikes and horses, posting on Facebook, or outgrowing her mother's shoe size. We didn't have a dog.

And I didn't have cancer. I had no idea I would get it, certainly not in the next decade, or that it would kill me.

Missing out
Why do I mention all this stuff? Because I've come to realize that, at any time, I can lament what I will never know, yet still not regret what got me where I am. I could have died in 2000 (at an "old" 31) and been happy with my life: my amazing wife, my great kids, a fun job, and hobbies I enjoyed. But I would have missed out on a lot of things.

And many things will now happen without me. As I wrote this, I hardly knew what most of them could even be. What will the world be like as soon as 2021, or as late as 2060, when I would have been 91, the age my Oma reached? What new will we know? How will countries and people have changed? How will we communicate and move around? Whom will we admire, or despise?

What will my wife Air be doing? My daughters Marina and Lolo? What will they have studied, how will they spend their time and earn a living? Will my kids have children of their own? Grandchildren? Will there be parts of their lives I'd find hard to comprehend right now?

What to know, now that I'm dead
There can't be answers today. While I was still alive writing this, I was sad to know I'll miss these things—not because I won't be able to witness them, but because Air, Marina, and Lauren won't have me there to support their efforts.

It turns out that no one can imagine what's really coming in our lives. We can plan, and do what we enjoy, but we can't expect our plans to work out. Some of them might, while most probably won't. Inventions and ideas will appear, and events will occur, that we could never foresee. That's neither bad nor good, but it is real.

I think and hope that's what my daughters can take from my disease and death. And that my wonderful, amazing wife Airdrie can see too. Not that they could die any day, but that they should pursue what they enjoy, and what stimulates their minds, as much as possible—so they can be ready for opportunities, as well as not disappointed when things go sideways, as they inevitably do.

I've also been lucky. I've never had to wonder where my next meal will come from. I've never feared that a foreign army will come in the night with machetes or machine guns to kill or injure my family. I've never had to run for my life (something I could never do now anyway). Sadly, these are things some people have to do every day right now.

A wondrous place
The world, indeed the whole universe, is a beautiful, astonishing, wondrous place. There is always more to find out. I don't look back and regret anything, and I hope my family can find a way to do the same.

What is true is that I loved them. Lauren and Marina, as you mature and become yourselves over the years, know that I loved you and did my best to be a good father.

Airdrie, you were my best friend and my closest connection. I don't know what we'd have been like without each other, but I think the world would be a poorer place. I loved you deeply, I loved you, I loved you, I loved you.

My final post

My final post

Posted on June 11, 2015 by rocho76

I never thought I would be writing this post at least not yet. A couple of weeks ago we went on holiday en famile. It was supposed to be a family treat to give me strength for facing more surgery in the form of a second lumpectomy and SIRT. Instead, it turned out to be the straw that broke the camel’s back. I seem to have picked up some sort of bug just before or on holiday, which rendered me really low. That, together with the break from chemotherapy, made my resistance to the liver lodgers impossible to deal with. I spent a lot of time feeling very low and lying on the bed in quite a lot of pain and unable to eat very much, with some days being unable to eat very much at all. Not much fun when you’re on holiday to eat and enjoy the lovely Israeli food we had sought out. I also had my first experience in 20 years feeling sick and throwing up on the airplane on the way back – puking twice on the way home. On top of that I needed a wheelchair at either end of the journey to help me through the airport, which was some shock at the beginning of the holiday and a grateful relief at the end.

I came straight back to a consultation with my breast surgeon to discuss the lumpectomy. He was horrified by the way I looked and insisted that if I had not got better within a matter of hours that he would pull me into hospital. He wanted me admitted to get better, if not for the immediate lumpectomy operation then certainly in time for the SIRT a few days later. And that was it.

I have spent the past ten days in hospitals on the edge of London away from home and my darling children, unfortunately declining swiftly. The infection that rendered me low meant that my liver cannot continue to fight the cancer and there is nothing that can be done and I have been told there are now only palliative options for me. I am hoping to get into a hospice soon although it seems to be a one in one out policy for these wonderful places, for obvious reasons. There at least I hope there will be a degree of peace and a pain-free environment there for me. No one will be able to tell me if it is a few days or weeks, but it certainly won’t be long.

I have been deluged with messages of love which have been lovely, overwhelming, thought provoking and very welcome. There have been many comparisons to my blog and other writings on the subject. I don’t want anyone to compare me to anyone else. This blog, “Fighting Genghis”, was never meant to be a competition for admirers or fame and fortune. I have no issues with the words “fight” or “loss of survival” or “die” unlike other people I have known. It was just my story of what I have been going through over the past almost year. Please remember that. Everyone’s journey is different, everyone’s journey is unique. Please remember me and my family. Thank you for reading. Rosie

Teressa Woodhead, 44, became only the third woman in the world to successfully give birth while taking powerful anti-cancer drug Herceptin

Inspirational mum who defied doctors to give birth and beat cancer weds with miracle daughter by her side
12:58, 10 AUGUST 2015
BY RICHARD WHEATSTONE , MARK LISTER

Teressa Woodhead, 44, became only the third woman in the world to successfully give birth while taking powerful anti-cancer drug Herceptin

A miracle mum who battled overwhelming odds to give birth to her baby daughter then beat the disease has tied the knot with her little girl by her side.

Teressa Woodhead, 44, became only the third woman in the world to successfully give birth while taking powerful anti-cancer drug Herceptin .

Teressa says she was planning her funeral as she fought breast cancer eight years ago but was stunned to hear she was pregnant while she underwent treatment she was told would leave her infertile.

After fighting back to give birth and then beat the disease she believes seven-year-old Keira gave her the strength to keep fighting.

Now Teressa has celebrated the day she thought she'd never see as she married her partner Neil Llewellyn with little Keira by her side as bridesmaid .

Teressa said: "I honestly did not think I would be standing here today. When I was first told I had breast cancer, I really hit rock bottom.

"I started planning for my funeral and I had even picked out the songs I wanted. It never occurred to me that just three months into my recovery I would be planning for a baby instead.

"I remember lying in bed one day, so tired I couldn't move and asking for a sign that I was going to be all right just a few weeks later I found out I was pregnant with Kiera.

"I do believe that she was sent to me as a sign that I was going to beat cancer and that I had a future."

But this was not the end of the family's troubles. Just two months after being given the all-clear from her breast cancer battle, Teressa was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in November 2011.

It was this latest sad news that inspired the happy couple to finally marry at St Nicholas' Church in Beverley, Yorks, with Kiera and their eldest daughter, Rhianne, 12, as bridesmaids.

"Life is too short not to do the things that make you happy," Teressa said.

"Sometimes, when I remember how low I was feeling when I was first diagnosed, it seems amazing that I am still here, I have to pinch myself to know it is real.

"But I really want people to know that there is life after breast cancer. We are living proof of that."

Miracle mum Kate Williams conceived baby Nel while taking Herceptin THE first mum in Britain to have a baby while taking Herceptin is today celebrating Mother’s Day with her “miracle child” – exactly five years to the day after being diagnosed with cancer.

Cancer survival rates three times higher with early diagnosis

Cancer survival rates three times higher with early diagnosis

Data from Cancer Research UK suggests 80% of patients survive for at least 10 years after being diagnosed in early stages of eight of most common cancers

James Meikle
Monday 10 August 2015 00.43 BST

The survival rate for people with eight of the most common cancers is more than three times higher when the disease is diagnosed early, Cancer Research UK said on Monday.

Data for thousands of patients between 1996 and 2000 suggests just over 80% of those with cancer survive for at least 10 years when their disease is diagnosed at stage one or two but only a quarter of those diagnosed at stage three or four live for at least a decade more.

Link to photo HERE

Ten-year survival is more than 90% for people whose cancer is diagnosed at stage one, compared with 5% for those whose disease is found at stage four.

The figures relate to people diagnosed in the east of England but Cancer Research believes they would be similar across the UK.

The cancers studied were bladder, bowel, breast, cervical, womb, malignant melanoma, ovarian and testicular cancers, which together account for more than four in 10 cancers. For the eight cancers, more than a quarter of cases are still diagnosed in the later stages, three and four.

Cancer stages are based on the size of tumours and how far they have spread through the body. More treatment options – and more effective treatments – are available in the early stages, said Cancer Research, which has previously reported that those diagnosed at an early stage cost significantly less to treat.

Sara Hiom, the charity’s director of early diagnosis, said: “These figures show the prize on offer if we can diagnose more cancers earlier. And, if the government acts on the recommendations in the new cancer strategy, we can increase the number of people diagnosed at an early stage across all cancer types – from around half of patients now to more than 60% per cent by 2020 – improving the outlook for thousands of people with the disease.”

Cancer survival has doubled in the past 40 years, said Hiom. But one in two people would be diagnosed with the disease at some point in their lives and early diagnosis and ensuring patients had access to the best treatment are essential to further improvements in survival.

“We need increased funding in NHS services and more research to develop tests to spot cancer sooner, and help more people to beat the disease.”

Dr Richard Roope, Cancer Research’s GP expert, said: “Diagnosing cancer early isn’t always easy – the symptoms may be vague or similar to less serious conditions, so cancer isn’t always the first thing you or your doctor considers. It’s important that people are aware of their bodies and, if they notice any unusual or persistent changes, they should see their GP.

“GPs play a critical role in early diagnosis; knowing when symptoms need to be investigated and referring patients promptly for tests, as well as making sure patients get test results quickly.”

Things I miss....

KAREN PANDY

When your life is thrown into chaos, there are many things that change.

There are a few things I miss and will never take for granted again. Just litttle things - such as I miss having hair.

I put all my hair products and appliances in a box and realised just how much stuff I had for my hair.

Not that I am particularly high maintenance, but I still managed to have a lot of hair stuff.
Going from having long hair to no hair in the space of a few weeks was quite a change.

I miss having eyebrows and eyelashes.
It is hard to give someone the evil one eyebrow raise when you have none.
At the moment, I look like a pasty Whoopi Goldberg.
I was wearing mascara in the hope that it would help keep my eyelashes.
However, after one shower, I came out and I looked in the mirror.
I was bald and pasty with dark rings under my eyes.
I reminded me of someone famous, it took me about five seconds to realise that I looked like Uncle Fester!

I miss being able to walk around without people looking at me wondering why I have a scarf on my head.

I also miss not being in pain.
Waking up every time I rolled over in bed because it would hurt, didn't make for restful sleep.

I miss my social life.
I really miss being able to make plans for the future.
Not that I am all doom and gloom, but I feel like there is a big black cloud hanging over me at the moment.
I can't just say 'yes' to invitations, I always have to check about when chemo or doctor's appointments are scheduled.

I also miss being alone and my independence.

I miss being able to go to work every day and make a contribution.

I miss being able to enjoy food and not have a chronic metallic taste in my mouth.
I really think the pharmacutical companies should make chemo mint flavoured, this metallic taste is horrid.
I would even be happy with rum flavoured chemo when there is a rugby game on, just to give me that rumbo feeling!

I miss being able to get in my car and drive up or down the coast on the weekend.

I miss not feeling nauseous and dizzy.

I miss feeling happy.
This time a year ago, I was really happy- my life was going well.

I miss having a few rums at the rugby and flirting with boys.
Nobody wants to flirt with a female Kojack.
I recall one Friday night when my parents were heading out to dinner.
I was getting ready for bed (at the late hour of 7.30pm) and my mother kept coming into my room asking my opinion about shoes and accessories.
I remember thinking how nice it was that they still went on dates after 42 years of marriage.
After they left, I started crying.

I missed getting dressed up and going on dates.

I miss having energy and not feeling exhausted all the time.

I miss being able to see my friends when I want to and not have to see who is blowing their nose or coughing.

I really miss seeing my nieces and nephews when I want.

Not wanting to get too graphic, but I miss going to the bathroom and not having it be a drama.
I miss not having to discuss my bathroom activities with anyone!
At the moment bathroom visits can last either twelve seconds or two hours.
I remember after one particularly crippling bathroom visit, my dad gave me some topical cream to ease my discomfort.
The list of side effects included - dizziness, fainting, nausea, headaches and anal leakage.
I weighed up the side effects with how I was feeling and felt that the risk of all of those was better than how I was feeling.
If I never have to discuss or experience manual evacuation again, I will be a very, very, very, very happy woman.

I know that this is all temporary and I will be able to return to my old life, but in the meantime, there are days where is sucks to be me.

I am aware that things could always be much worse and I am fortunate that I am going to get the opportunity to get better and do all those things that I miss once again.

The Discovery

KAREN PANDY

Someone famous said that the journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. My journey started with an itch. It was the end of November 2009 and I was happily planning for my four day birth festival to celebrate my 35th birthday. The biggest thing I was worried about was whether to invite a certain guy to the festivities. I remember being uncontrollably sad that Saturday about him and I couldn't stop crying. Which is very unlike me and my best friend in Sydney was so worried, she wanted to jump on a plane and fly up to Brisbane immediately.

It had been a tough year with the GFC affecting my work and failed relationships, but it also included a trip to South America and the opportunity to work in Melbourne. Work had picked up, boy issues had faded and No-man-vember was in full swing. I gave myself each November off from men, just to take a break and not have to deal with boy issues. Things were looking up for 2010. Then I had an itch.

I had gotten home from my cousin's birthday and was watching late night tv and my left boob had an itch. When I went to scratch it I found a few little lumps in a row - almost like a ropey formation. It was worried, but there was not much I could do late Saturday night. Sunday morning I rang my sister to seek advice. Mostly about which would be less humiliating - having my dad feel me up or my brother. There are many advantages about having doctors in the family, but a few downfalls also - like having them feel you up! I decided to call my brother, but as he wasn't available until the afternoon, I went to see my father early Sunday morning. Not wanting to unnecessarily worry my excessively worrying mother, I asked to see Dad, which only served to worry my mother further. After being palpated by my father, he suggested that the lump may be fatty deposit, but would be wise to have an ultrasound just to make sure.

The next morning, armed with the morning off work, a referral and my worried mother, I went to the x-ray place. I had managed to calm myself into a state of believing that this was going to be a pain-free embarrassing event and I should be more diligent with self breast checks in the future. When I pointed out the area of concern to the sonographer, she seemed unfazed by what I had found. I felt relief for about 8 seconds until she had discovered something far more interesting, which she bought to my attention by saying, 'I know you were concerned by those small lumps, but have you felt this very large hard lump in the middle of your breast?'. I was shocked to discover that during my (not very) thorough self breast examination I had failed to feel the Uranus sized lump located in the middle of my breast. She took a few pictures of it and asked for me to wait for the films to be developed. I was still unconcerned by the large black mass I saw on the screen, and while waiting for the films, I was discussing lunch options with my mother. When I was called back to the desk, she advised me that in the 2.7 minutes since my ultrasound, that the radiographer had spoken to my father and they are 'just' going to stick a need in the large lump to see what it is. I rather enjoyed the use of the word 'just' as a pre-fix when discussing sticking needles in me. It's almost if they use the word 'just' it acts as a local anaesthetic, so there is no pain.

I returned the next day, once again armed with my mother for the biopsy. Looking at the ultrasound as they guided the needle through the large dark lump was scary, but I couldn't look away. We were advised that the results would be available in the morning, but that it looked like it was a fibroid adenoma. After googling and asking a few doctor friends, I decided not to worry and went to the movies that night. It was Tuesday night and I thought the worst part of the week was being felt up by my father and having to sit through 'Twilight - New Moon' - God, I couldn't have been more wrong.

“When I die”

LISA B. ADAMS

When I die don’t think you’ve lost me.

I’ll be right there with you, living on in the memories we have made.

When I die don’t say I “fought a battle.” Or “lost a battle.” Or “succumbed.”

Don’t make it sound like I didn’t try hard enough, or have the right attitude, or that I simply gave up.

When I die don’t say I “passed.”

That sounds like I walked by you in the corridor at school.

When I die tell the world what happened.

Plain and simple.

No euphemisms, no flowery language, no metaphors.

Instead, remember me and let my words live on.

Tell stories of something good I did.

Give my children a kind word. Let them know what they meant to me. That I would have stayed forever if I could.

Don’t try to comfort my children by telling them I’m an angel watching over them from heaven or that I’m in a better place:

There is no better place to me than being here with them.

They have learned about grief and they will learn more.

That is part of it all.

When I die someday just tell the truth:

I lived, I died.

The end.

Curtain falling

LISA B. ADAMS

They were already seated when we arrived, a sea of white sitting cramped.

Mostly couples, though some were in girl groups.

They didn’t rise when we needed to pass by.

Clearly that effort would be too much.

I know how that feels.

Almost all wore glasses, most eventually pulled out bags of snacks or sucking candies.

No one texted or emailed or checked the time on a phone.

They all had small watches on their wrists for that.

In front of me a man had a bandage on the top of his head, white gauze perched amidst his silver hair, a good head of it.

I decided a funny looking mole, irregular in shape, had lain there recently; his wife pressed him to go see the dermatologist to have it checked.

The two looked out for each other, you see, having been together so long.

The air was still and thick and choked me as the minutes wore on.

I could see the veins protruding on the back of their hands, the wrinkles, the hunched shoulders.

We were the youngest there.

And while I felt more like them in many ways, closer to the end than to the beginning, I realize I am an outsider in every group.

There are few like me.

My hair won’t get that white, you see,

My hands won’t be rewarded with that saggy skin.

I won’t be privileged enough to see him go bald.

It will always be “in sickness” now.

The lights finally went down and I tried to forget.

But my body and mind do not ever let me.

How jealous I was of those elderly people crowded into a movie theater on an August Sunday afternoon.

In each equation I calculate, the result is always time

LISA B. ADAMS

For three days I’ve been mostly bedridden. During two days of sixty degree weather I didn’t make it out of the front door. What I believe is a virus sidelined me for the weekend and today (Monday) I’m still trying to get strength back. Thankfully I think it’s my immune system making me the target; no one else in the family has gotten it.

Tomorrow I will go back to Sloan-Kettering for another attempt at a thoracentesis. I have had many people ask more about the process and what it is. This was a very good summary with a graphic. It kind of gives me the willies (does anyone even say “willies” anymore?) to look at that.

When even television seems too much,
And hours go by staring out the window.

I listen to the sounds of my children playing,
I hear life go on without me.

It was a day like this that I wrote the lyrics to the song “Six Minutes,”
A day I wished for the time to go. Just go by faster.
But as on that day,
Today I am aware that these are the days I’m fighting for.
If I didn’t want them I wouldn’t be doing all of this.

I know that this is a tough day. Tomorrow will be one, too.
But I also know that someday, hopefully long from now, it will count as a good day, a great day.
And that realization scares me too.

I spoke with a patient care representative at Sloan about some of the mistakes that were made on Friday. I told her my story and we talked about some ways she could follow up. I told her I wasn’t angry, I know mistakes happen, but I thought there were ways to try to make sure these things didn’t happen again. At the end she gave me her contact information. I said, “I love my doctors and the care I get. But there are always ways to improve. I appreciate the chance to give those suggestions to someone who can do something about them.”

Then I started laughing. “You know, I hope to be calling you with suggestions for many years to come. That will mean I’m still here, trying to help patients get better care and trying to help doctors and nurses provide it.” She started laughing too. “You know, I really like that perspective. I’m not sure I’ve ever heard it put that way. I like thinking about more suggestions as meaning more time.” We thanked each other and hung up.

And I thought about it.
Everything is an equation now.
Everything is a calculation.
Everything has a cost.
I try to balance risks.
I study statistics and results.
But in each equation I calculate, the result is always time.
Nothing is more valuable than time that I am able to enjoy the world and those around me.