2021 theme: RUPTURE

SHATTERING THE ILLUSION OF CONTROL Jenn Sutkowski The call you don’t want: “May I speak to Jennifer, please?”

“This is,” I answered, shaking because it was Kelly Dusenbery from The Hofman Breast Center at Mount Auburn Hospital in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

“Unfortunately—” That word echoed and ampliied in my head so loud I swore my husband could hear it because he peered around the corner at my face as I slumped onto the couch with the heft of the news. Suddenly there was a crack in the ground between my old life and me.

F-ing cancer?

I was diagnosed with Ductal Carcinoma In Situ, stage zero, in my right breast. After my irst mammogram (and subsequent biopsy) at age forty. Like, huh? It’s nearly the last thing you expect.

“In Situ’ means it is in place, in the duct, it hasn’t spread,” Kelly said.

“That is good. It is the earliest stage, and you’ll have surgery and probably radiation but not chemo, and then you’ll go on medication, and if you tolerate the medication, you’ll stay on it for a few years.”

I took a deep breath and sighed long and hard.

“OK?” Kelly said.

“OK”? Can I say no?

How about: “Yeah, not OK. Smell ya laterrrr. Byeeee.”

But I said yes. I mean, what the hell else was I going to do?

I wondered how much of my body I would lose. I had cat scans and ultrasounds and MRIs and blood tests to check if the cancer I had was the only cancer I had and whether I was prone to more cancer. While waiting on my genetic testing to come through – to see whether I had the BRCA-1 or BRCA2 mutation – the room that was my body expanded and contracted like I was on acid.

“How much of this am I going to keep?” I wondered, holding my breasts and my belly. Sharp butterlies lew through my stomach with every thought.

“Should I have a mastectomy? A double mastectomy?”

43