Midlife Breast Cancer Diagnosis | How a Cosmetic Procedure Saved Her Life - WTF Just Happened?

SPEAKER_02: Hello everyone. It's Hillary. Welcome back to What the F Just Happened. On today's episode, we have our friend Monica with us, and we're so excited to have you here in studio with us.

SPEAKER_03: Thank you.

SPEAKER_02: Today's episode is about Monica's story and what happens when you are diagnosed with what we call the big C. And Monica's gonna kind of take us through that journey. And of course, Sada's in studio with me as well. Yes, I'm right here.

SPEAKER_02: So Monica, tell us a little bit about you, your life, how this all went down.

SPEAKER_03: Okay. Well, thank you for having me. My name is Monica. I'm 21. I wish I was 21. I am actually 51, going to be 52 last year. If you're gonna jump right into it. Well, no, I'm gonna I'm gonna do a little bit of background. I've always been athletic. Yeah. I have played sports all my life. I eat well. I've never been overweight. I've never had any illnesses, nothing other than orthopedic orthopedic issues, like you know, you hurt your knee or hurt your back. Because you were a athlete soccer player in college and everything.

SPEAKER_03: And always worked out, always kept myself what I considered relatively healthy. So um after having two kids, yeah. Most of us have our kids, yeah. Married, I've been married almost 29 years now, and I have two incredible young men as my children. One is gonna be 23, one is gonna be one is 20. He'll be 21 this year as well. I just decided that uh, well, okay, we've all done trisepatide. I lost some weight, yeah, and I thought, okay, now I got to my my goal that I wanted to look, but then the girls were just deflated.

SPEAKER_03: They're tiny, little, tiny little boobies. So I said to my husband, um, I'd really like to get a mommy makeover. Yeah. And he reluctantly agreed because he's you're perfect the way you are, you don't need to do it. He always make a joke like, This wasn't my idea. So, anyway, uh he agreed. And last February I was going to get uh some implants so that I could have some curves again. And I found a great surgeon locally here in Boise. I went in and I had the surgery, and I was pretty stoked when I came out of surgery.

SPEAKER_03: I liked what I saw. Of course, anyone that knows is familiar with surgery, you have to have a follow-up. You go to the doctor for your post-surgical appointments. So I went two days after my surgery. Uh it was February 16th, was my post-op appointment.

SPEAKER_01: And I went in and I went to talk to the doctor, and he said the surgery went well, but and we're talking February of 2025. Okay, yeah. So we're on we're about a year about a year ago. Yeah, almost exactly a year.

SPEAKER_03: So he sits down, really nice guy. Um, he sits down and he said, Uh the surgery went really well, and I was thinking this is great. And oh, by the way, my husband's sitting in the car because he's so embarrassed because he doesn't want anyone to think that it was his idea to do this, right? So he's like, I'll wait in the car. So he's sitting in the car. I'm supposed to get the drains out and just hear how well it went, and yay, you now you got curves and everything. So um, he told me it went well, but he did find a little piece of tissue that he thought was suspicious.

SPEAKER_03: So he sent it away to pathology.

SPEAKER_01: And unfortunately, Monica, you have breast cancer, and so I'm sitting there and just staring, like the plastic surgeon tells you that you not anybody else that he sent it to, not your PCP, not you know, you he tells you. Yes, because it came back.

SPEAKER_03: He told me, okay, and the whole time I'm sitting there in the car. Yeah. And he said, We need to get your husband. And so the oh my goodness, the front receptionist goes out, gets Steve out of the car, and says, You need to come in. And we and so Steve tells me later that he was thinking like maybe it had to be redone, it wasn't successful, whatever.

SPEAKER_03: So he sits down and he tells us that it that it he found a tumor, or what he suspected to be a tumor, but then the lab confirmed. It was a very surreal moment just because I'm thinking, ha ha, okay, jokes on me, let's just move on. Um, but also not, you know, I'm thinking, well, uh clearly he wouldn't make a joke like that. And and this surgeon, uh, I won't name his name just for the sake of this, but uh, he's my guard, he's my guardian angel. He he didn't have to take a tissue sample. I think most surgeons probably just do their job, move on, but he happened to find this tiny, infinitesimal, little tiny, tiny piece of tissue that he just thought didn't look right.

SPEAKER_03: And so he caught it. And what's strange is I am very good about getting my mammograms. I am on time. I've had things in the past where they're like, oh, you have very dense breast tissue. Everybody talks about dense breast tissue. Almost every woman that I've talked to since my diagnosis says, Yeah, I have the same thing. I'm like, just make sure you get, you know, it's not even enough to get the 3D mammogram anymore. Yeah. By the way, I know I'm skipping ahead, but because everybody has breast dense breast tissue.

SPEAKER_03: And if you don't get a really thorough exam and on time, you know, you you could be in a position like mine or worse. So anyway, uh ends up that I have stage, I was diagnosed with stage one triple positive breast cancer, which you're probably going lost.

SPEAKER_02: So tell me what that means because I I've only known, I think, one other person, and that was my first entry into it as an acquaintance. So I didn't know her like super well. But I was shocked when I kind of heard that there's I was like, oh, breast cancer, it's breast cancer, but it's not. It's there's so many variations. So tell me what does that mean?

SPEAKER_03: Triple positive, and and you're right, there are so many variations, and I I like you thought the same thing. So triple positive means your estrogen, progesterone, and what this biomarker that they now have, I think it's the most uh like the last 20 years is when they've identified this other biomarker. It's called her too, H E R2. Okay, and so if you're positive estrogen, positive progesterone, and positive HER2, it's called triple positive. People can be estrogen, what they call it, E R P R H E R. So it's estrogen, progesterone, her two.

SPEAKER_03: So you can be ER negative, PR positive, H E R negative. I mean, there's like umpteen million different varieties. And so whatever your diagnosis is, the treatment is then capable of.

SPEAKER_02: Figure that out from the tissue?

SPEAKER_03: Yes.

SPEAKER_02: So the tissue sample goes to the lab, and that's how they come back with this is what this is. Yes. Okay. So now Steve's in the office with you and you're hearing this news, and your drains are out at this point. Bandage, what like is this in the actual, let's say one of the rooms, or is this in his office?

SPEAKER_03: It's in the exam room. Because they needed to take the drains out. He's he actually put the implants in because I paid him to, and he didn't know at the time because he was taking a tissue sample. It could have been nothing.

SPEAKER_05: Yeah.

SPEAKER_03: So uh unfortunately it came back that it wasn't, but he just still did his job, and sure, you know, I was grateful for it because at least I had nice knockers until I had to get those removed. Always a soul relying. Oh, you gotta look at that. We do, we do. Yeah, we do. So um that hearing that I had breast cancer wasn't the hardest part. Seeing my husband's face was the hardest part. Did he fall apart? He, I mean, he contained him, he contained himself for my sake. Yeah, but just seeing the the sadness and the devastation on his face was the hardest part of hearing that.

SPEAKER_03: I tend to compartmentalize things. Yeah, I think I'm a very good person at coping because this is for another episode, but you know, you have a pretty traumatic childhood, you learn how to deal with stuff, and you compartmentalize it. You're like, okay, that was that, I'm moving on. That's just how I deal with adversity. But seeing his face, that that was crushing. But from that moment on, it was just okay, what do we gotta do? What does this mean?

SPEAKER_02: So you're in office, you hear this, and he says, like, what happens next? Like, what is you're leave that office with what information?

SPEAKER_03: He says, I know a good cancer team, and I'm going to call their offices right now, and they will call you, and then he's basically passing me off to them.

SPEAKER_02: Sure, now we're gonna go into oncology. And when do you hear from them?

SPEAKER_03: That day. They called me immediately because triple positive breast cancer is aggressive, it can spread rapidly. Uh, I caught it super early, and then that's where I say, like, by the grace of God, I could have easily waited another four or five months to get a mammogram, not had yeah. I mean, people wait all the time, right? They just push it off.

SPEAKER_01: I literally I I missed my mammogram like two weeks ago. And I because I saw the appointment. Yeah, no, I've never missed ever in my life, but I knew, I just knew, like, I I know I need to reschedule it. I've never missed in my life. I just got I feel like it was like a busy week and I was like, oh my gosh, I can't believe I missed it. And they called me and said, Let's reschedule, but yeah, I've never I've never missed it. So, you know, but then there's also stories out there that say, like your mammogram, did did it cat could it have really caught it, or did it take opening up your body for the doctor to actually find an a mammogram or a 3D now that we or is it 4D, whatever the would they give us the option of now?

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, would it have not caught it?

SPEAKER_03: Probably not. The location of my tumor was kind of it was very it was on the very underneath side of my left breast, almost on my rib cage. Oh, you can't get that into the plates. We all uh as women, we know what that's like, right?

SPEAKER_02: Squishing, right?

SPEAKER_03: You can't get that section, so it could have gone undetected. So uh, you know, for me, it's like God did this, God led me to that. And so, you know, whether you're religious or not is is irrelevant. I I happen to believe that God was watching out for me at that moment.

SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you're right. So okay, so now they so you guys drive home and Steve is probably we're both. I mean I was gonna say, were you talking? Was it just silence? I can't remember. Okay.

SPEAKER_03: It was it was kind of a blur. I mean, much like any traumatic situation, you just kind of like moments plank out. Right.

SPEAKER_02: And now all of a sudden we're now waiting for oncology to call you. And you got in how quickly?

SPEAKER_03: I think it was the next day. Uh it was a great group. So there's the breast surgeon, which I met first, and then she has a team of the reconstruction surgeon and the oncologist. And so they're all women. Oh, I had the best team through St. Luke's here locally, and so I met with her within days, I think. It was within days, and that was wild. I still remember it was pouring rain, and we went to her little tiny office. Uh, you would never think that it was a doctor's office, it was like a house that was converted into a doctor's office, and she was just very fast talking, drawing pictures, and Steve and I are just I mean, our heads are spinning because I'm hearing words like chemotherapy and mastectomies and all these things.

SPEAKER_03: I'm thinking, well, but I'm stage one and it was tiny, and like, how could I have to have chotherapy before, like, do we really did he get the whole tumor? Are there any other tumors? So there's a thousand questions. And I'm sitting there thinking, like, surely it's gone, right? But I'm also of the school of thought that do whatever you have to do. I'm too young and I do not want to die. So if I have to go straight to chemotherapy, do it. Yeah, like I trust, I trust somewhat, I trust, you know, what I'm being told.

SPEAKER_02: Had you done the deep dive, like come home and get on your computer? Yes. And go into AI. I was obsessed. Okay, so we did the deep dive. So before you even got to that appointment, you've gone down the rabbit hole now.

SPEAKER_03: No, I I didn't I went to the appointment first, and then based on all the information she gave me, I was googling everything and trying to figure out what does this even mean? Because it's it's doctor lingo, and a lot of it you're just I don't get it. I don't understand.

SPEAKER_02: Was Steve able to absorb any? Because I always say, like, right, take a friend, take a partner, take a spouse, because they hear things differently. Is he able to hear other things that were different than you heard?

SPEAKER_03: We were both confused.

SPEAKER_02: Okay, it's gotta be sad.

SPEAKER_03: Yeah, we were both just overwhelmed with information, emotion. But fortunately, we have a we have a friend, uh family friend of ours that Steve's been friends since high school, and he's a colorectal surgeon, deals a lot with cancers and stuff, and and so we called him, we and we told him, and uh, you know, because he deals with cancers, he deals with oncologists, and we told him the protocol because we're like, why would I have to do chemo? Nobody wants to lose their hair, nobody wants to be sick.

SPEAKER_03: But we gave him all the information. He he then passed it along to his oncology team that deals with all the breast cancers and stuff, and he came back and he's like, That's exactly the protocol you need to do.

SPEAKER_02: So that was like also felt so okay. Deep breath.

SPEAKER_03: Yep. So I was like, all right, we have a game plan. And sometimes I feel like I mean, your daughter has Crohn's, and I feel like if you know what you're dealing with, it's easier sometimes. And then I have a friend who has mold poisoning, and she has all these symptoms and she doesn't know what it's what's causing it necessarily. So I feel like once you get a diagnosis and a game plan, yes, much like Crohn's, you're like, okay, I'm I don't want to speak for you because maybe it's not like this for Crohn's.

SPEAKER_03: So I'm I'm sorry if I'm assuming, but it when you have a clear diagnosis and a clear path, right?

SPEAKER_02: It calms you down. Yeah. Because when Maddie was first sick, you guys weren't sure what it was. It took him in. No, it took a long time.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah. She had a colonoscopy and an endoscopy to even determine that's how they determine if it's Crohn's, even though one of the doctors suspected. But yeah, once you have a game plan, and then from there.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I feel like I could resonate with what you said, Monica, about like you just kind of go, oh, okay. So like what okay, so that's a that's a diagnosis. So like what can we do now? So Maddie, you can go back to GCU and like just we'll take you back to school and you'll be just like a pill and you'll be good to go. And it's like, oh no, that doesn't happen. So um, yeah, it's and you and you have to hope the chemo works and the medication works. I mean, Maddie's this is her third medication. So, you know, and there's not a ton out there, but like, you know, chemo and all of that.

SPEAKER_01: So yeah, I get that for sure. I get that.

SPEAKER_03: At least it gives you a little bit of peace of mind.

SPEAKER_01: Okay, we have a game plan. Yes, yes, absolutely. Once you have a game plan and you stop putting shit into chat GPT and scaring the daylights out of yourself, you really can just like start to scoop up your support and your kids and your husband and your girlfriends, and just say, like, gotta press forward because a million other people go through the same thing, whether they lose a spouse or they have stage four cancer, stage one cancer, autoimmune, whatever it is, you know. Yeah, it's like, you know, yeah.

SPEAKER_02: Did you come home? How did you tell your friends? How did you tell your family?

SPEAKER_03: That was hard. Kids, your sons. Kids was the hardest because both my sons are in college and we're very, very tight family.

SPEAKER_03: Sorry. No, you're doing great. That was the hardest because one of my son, my older son, Vince, he's he's just the most I think he compartmentalizes like I do, where he's like, all right, okay, we need to we got this, we got this, we're good. And then my younger son is just uh super emotional. So telling them I had to approach them differently. And I wanted to tell them right away because I knew they'd be upset if I had withheld this, but I struggled because one was in Texas, one was in Los Angeles, and I'm here in Idaho.

SPEAKER_03: So it's like, wow, how do how do I drop this bomb on them? My biggest concern was I didn't want their lives to change. They were doing so well in school. They, you know, they both have a great friend group, like everything's going great for them. And scary because they can't get to you. They can't get to me. They don't know if I feel sick, they don't know what I look like, and I hadn't gone through any treatments yet or anything, but in their mind, I could have they could have been like, mom's dying, right?

SPEAKER_03: Right. And so that was that was really, really hard to tell them. And they reacted exactly as I expected. You know, my older son was like, okay, all right, mom, let's go. Let's do it. We're on the field. And my younger son was in the middle of uh pledging for a fraternity. He was a freshman in college at the time. And fortunately, he is at a school that is very faith-based, and all of the fraternity just said, you know, Gianni, you take as much time as you need. So he just holed up in his room for a week just to digest it, and he didn't have to go through all the pledge stuff and all that.

SPEAKER_02: They're very supportive. So supportive, especially for young men.

SPEAKER_03: And then, because of the timing of it, they were coming home for spring break within the month. So that was godsend because they could come home and they could say, Oh, mom's still the same. Still got our energy, like nothing's weird. Yeah, so oh, thank you. Yeah, I'll and uh yeah, so telling them was the hardest. Yeah, and and then the rest of the family. Girlfriends probably rallied right around. Oh my gosh. I mean, the the premise of this is to talk about dealing with you know, how do you cope with uh loss or illness?

SPEAKER_03: And I'm telling you, the two things that got me through it. Uh, I'll preface it by saying I feel very fortunate that it was caught early because I know a lot of people that aren't as fortunate that don't do as well with the medication and the surgeries. I mean, if you have to have cancer, I hope you have it like I did because it was seamless. So the two things that got me through were the fact that I knew I was not gonna die. I mean, I just knew it in my bones. I thought it's early and I got a good team and everything else.

SPEAKER_03: Humor. Yeah, you have to have humor. No matter what degree of loss or hardship, you have to have humor. And then friends. I mean, my friends, you guys, I barely knew you guys when I was diagnosed, and still I got this incredible gift basket, just so loving of books and blankets, and I got texts, and yeah, I mean, it was non-stop. It was non-stop. Almost I felt kind of guilty because I never felt sick. Yeah. And I thought, oh my god, all these people doing all these things, and I'm I'm doing fine.

SPEAKER_03: Like, I'm still going to Pilates, I'm still doing my thing, even all through chemo. I really never felt that bad.

SPEAKER_02: Yeah, that's amazing. How far how quickly did you start chemo? Like, what was the actual plan? Did you start really quickly? Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: When did your like surgery happen? Yeah.

SPEAKER_03: Yeah. So the the plan for me, I think it, I think it's called adjunctive. So rather than so the the the plan I was given was you definitely have to do chemotherapy, which was really difficult to be like, what come on. I I'm so early.

SPEAKER_02: And that's like IV chemotherapy because I know a lot of them are oral. Yeah, it's IV. Yes, there are oral.

SPEAKER_03: So okay. This was IV. Um, and I was kind of shocked by that because in my mind, I'm thinking, well, if you're early stage, maybe you can go the other route before you have to go there. But it again, it depends on the kind. That you have. So the kind that I had was aggressive enough so that what they want to do is kill all the cancer cells that they can. And then I had the once I was done with chemo, or I had three months of chemo. And I had to go every single Monday for three months. So it was 12 treatments total.

SPEAKER_03: And I'd have to go into the clinic, and it was about eight hours every Monday.

SPEAKER_02: So you come in, you got your iPad, you got movies. Yeah, got a book, got a whatever you got going.

SPEAKER_03: Do you have someone go with you? Steve never missed one appointment. Not one. He didn't miss a treatment. He didn't miss an appointment. He never miss, never missed the thing. And I would think, God, this is so easy. You know, like I you don't have to come. He's like, yeah. Oh. I'm not anything. He wouldn't be anywhere else. Would not do anything else, would not leave my side. So it was 12 weeks of that where I received the chemotherapy and what was called her septin. It's a medication, it's like a monoclonial antibody.

SPEAKER_03: And that is specific to the HER2 proponent component of the cancer. So I did that for 12 months. And I started losing my hair about four months into this. No, excuse me. Four and I get all confused. It was about if it was three months, about two months in. So eight weeks into the 12-week cycle. Is it just to sort of like shed? How does that like I don't know?

SPEAKER_02: Or does it come out in clumps?

SPEAKER_03: It came out in clumps. Really? And it was last April. It was about April in 2025. And I was thinking, oh my gosh, I'm I don't think I'm gonna lose my hair.

SPEAKER_05: And all the doctors kept saying, Oh wait, you're gonna lose your hair.

SPEAKER_03: And I'm I'm eight weeks into a 12-week and I'm thinking, right, I'm on a dodge this person. Yeah. And it was overnight.

SPEAKER_02: Overnight. It was overnight. And I'm gonna give you guys because you I can't see Monica, but we'll have to put a post a picture of her of her up. She's I can't tell you. I mean, she's gorgeous, stunning. Yeah, little, like prettiest face ever, darling. But when you didn't have hair, which is when I met you, I mean, you've never seen someone more gorgeous with hair, no, with you, stunning. And she's got this perfectly shaped head where if you took my hair off, I'm gonna probably have a flat back or something.

SPEAKER_03: But I didn't know head perfectly shaped. I again I got very lucky because none of us want to shave our heads. No, and so my husband surprised me. Uh it was March, early April of last year. He knew I wasn't feeling great, but he's like, We're gonna go to the desert. So we went to Palm Desert, and uh he surprised me by flying my younger son home from Texas, and my older son drove in from LA. Nice, and that week, but when I was at the desert, the hair was just really it was coming out. Did you finally shave?

SPEAKER_03: So the day after we got home from the desert, I said, I'm ready, I'm ready. Because it was just it was just a constant reminder, it was a nuisance for sure, because it was just all over my clothes and in the shower, just yeah, almost like you shave it and you're like, Let's go.

SPEAKER_01: It was great, like let's get it started.

SPEAKER_03: It was the best thing ever. I don't know if I ever showed you guys the picture, but um, so we did a FaceTime with my boys. Now they're back in at school. And I said, It's time, I'm gonna shave my head. And so I was in the shower, my husband's shaving my head. I said, Wait, wait, wait, don't do it all. Let's do a mohawk first.

SPEAKER_04: Let's do great.

SPEAKER_03: And so he shaves it in a mohawk. And since we're on FaceTime, my younger son took some screenshots and I was like, you know, giving the devil fingers, like, yeah, and back in the 80s. Yes, yeah. And so uh, yeah, and when I shaved it, I felt much better. I know a lot, it's so that was just my identity. It's our identity, it is, yeah, and it's my own personal experience embracing it. I know a lot of women who are very devastated to lose their hair. It's I cannot, and I don't blame them. Like it's it's uh it's a personal thing, and and it's your it's your identity, like you said.

SPEAKER_02: It's also, I mean, I know for just the people I've known who have had it, um, not breast cancer, but other cancers, it's the I look sick. I look sick. I'm ill. Yes. So that was when my mom was going through that and she her hair, I I don't know if I actually know how much hair she lost because then she we had aria on, but she's got phenomenal wigs or toppers or extensions. So I don't know how thin her hair got, but she never lost one. But that's what I remember her saying was I don't want to be perceived as a sick person because hers is also, although it's caused a lot of other issues, it's not it's a like a slow growing, and so you have all these other issues from the chemo have caused damage.

SPEAKER_02: Yeah, but the cancer, she wasn't gonna die from the cancer, it was gonna be the other things that pop in. But that was her big thing was I don't want to look like a male. Well, and it puts everybody else in a very odd space because they don't know what to say. Yeah, and that was I was gonna ask you is okay, so you're going through treatment, your girlfriends obviously rally around you, you have lots of great girlfriends from all stages of life. Yes. So girlfriends rally around you, families rallying around you.

SPEAKER_02: Yep. Like, does that stay consistent the entire time?

SPEAKER_03: For the most part, yes. That's wonderful. The big family that I thought maybe would show more interest didn't. Interesting. Okay.

SPEAKER_02: It was not interesting in a good way.

SPEAKER_03: No, uh yeah, I'll just say it. My sister and my mom my dad has passed away, and I was not very close with him, but it was obligatory on my sister's part to reach out. And to her credit, she would text me every Tuesday after my Monday treatment. The minute the treatment stopped, ghost gone. So it was just, I think it was more. I hate to say this because I'm projecting, but knowing her the way I do, I think it was for herself. I think it made her feel better to say, Well, I did my part.

SPEAKER_01: I checked the box. I checked on her. And I feel like a lot of people do stuff like that because they don't know, like, whatever your relationship is. Obviously, we can all say we have relationships with family or friends that are, you know, can be a little dicey, but uh yeah. I mean, she's probably like, I'm I'm checking my boxes and I'm patting myself on the back and I did my part, and now you're good to go. Yes. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03: That's how I feel. It was very much so. And am I?

SPEAKER_01: And it's very much the same with like losing Chris. You see, there's definitely people that you maybe thought would be there for you more, be there for or people that came out of the woodworks, actually, that uh that you didn't expect. No, that like still text me to this. I said on our podcast the other day, you know, my my girlfriend Tracy's mom sends me a card like every three weeks. My girlfriend from high school. She had stage four breast cancer. She's alive, well, amazing, so good. Thank god.

SPEAKER_01: She sends me a card every like three weeks without fail. And that's like her her thing. She's not doing it at all. I know she's doing it because she loves me and she's continued to do it 16 months later, you know. But I think you have these people that you're like, oh my gosh, you would never think that that person would do that for you, or um, a text message from even kind of like strangers that maybe lost their spouse or lost or had cancer that you're like, my own people that you're close to hardly, you know, contribute or to even like your healing process.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah. It's just a very strange who comes out of the woodwork, who steps up, who steps back. And I don't blame anyone for any reaction. And so my point was like, people just don't know what to do, right? They don't know how to handle it, that maybe they had trauma in the past, that they don't know how maybe it it triggers something for them, loss-wise, cancer-wise, whatever, that it it makes them just not able to be there or help in a way that maybe you thought they'd show up, but then you just we just gotta give grace, I guess, right?

SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah. That is the best way to put it, I think, is to give grace because no one knows what to say, no one knows how to look at you, they don't know what level of support, yeah, you know, and and and then it makes you feel bad. You go through the same thing. Losing Chris, it's like at some point you're like, it's okay, you know, or I'm good, or I'm not good, or you know, but they don't know. And so I never know what to do. You don't want to know what to say. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: Should I say his name? Will that set me off? Like an will I have a crying attack? You know, will I be so sad? And you know, uh yeah, like when you were talking about the boys, like telling your kids was like, I don't know why that triggered me. It just made me feel like that was the that was the hardest part for me to tell the girls, you know. So when you said you had to tell your boys, I was like, oh fuck, that's like so hard to have to have to like tell your kids that you know the rock solid statue in your family unit is ill and like but you're gonna or gone.

SPEAKER_01: Like, yeah, like yeah, like in your case, gone. Like and I think final yeah, I couldn't tell them and obviously until they they got to the hospital in Hawaii, but you know, that was like yeah, it's like hard to have to just like face your kids and and tell them that you know their mom's sick and that you're like, I'm gonna be good, I'm gonna tell you guys, but they don't know, they don't know what they don't know, and they're young, you know. So now obviously we're as women in our 40s and 50s, we're like solid and we know like none of us are getting out of here alive, but what can we do in the interim to support each other?

SPEAKER_01: It's like, yeah, it's such a people just don't know what to do, let alone we don't know, we didn't know how to tell our kids, you know, like we've never gone through that before.

SPEAKER_03: No, and you never anticipate having to tell them, yeah, your father's unexpectedly passed away, and or I have cancer, or like well, the thing is you also like you can say, like, oh, it's I'm gonna be okay, but you don't know.

SPEAKER_02: I don't know. Your mind, your mind is spinning. You're you're like, right? I don't know what you said to the girls, but I mean, all lives in those moments are flipped on a dime, yeah, and you're just right, you're trying to soothe other people, right? Why your heart is shattered. Steve's heart is shattered.

SPEAKER_01: I'm always accommodating for other people so that they don't feel bad. And that's what I I'm learning that over the over, you know, this time period of like, I think that's why it can go quiet very easily, or I don't I don't do well with small talk because you are like you're truly accommodating for other people so that they don't feel bad if you're like at a a restaurant table and it's someone's like, How are you doing? Gosh, Chris was so funny. And it's like they don't know if they can say that.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, because like, will it trigger me to like fall apart? Or, you know, they don't want to ruin the dinner, or I mean Okay, so I have a question about that then for both of you, because as someone who hasn't lost a spouse who hasn't been diagnosed with something large, how and for someone sometimes you know you don't know what to say.

SPEAKER_02: You and that's what we talked about on our last episode and on a friendship episode of if you have a good girl gang together or any type of friends, this is a conversation you need to have in advance of stuff happening so that people can go into action mode because everyone wants to do something. That's like our only response. It's the go fund me's, it's the doing the meal trains, it's doing the errands, whatever it is. You want to do something. Yeah, you want to contribute so that person knows that you care about them, love them, are thinking of them, praying for them, all of it.

SPEAKER_02: But now you're let's say diagnosed and you've lost breath. Let's say now we're six months in, you're still on your uh journey of medical treatment, you're obviously uh dealing with a totally different life. When people show up, do you want them like where and any advice I would say to anyone listening, do you want them to acknowledge, oh my gosh, you look amazing. How are you feeling? Is that okay to ask? How are you doing? Because that's the thing is you don't want to ignore it. Yeah. So then where's like what's comfortable, what's not comfortable?

SPEAKER_02: If that makes sense. Yes.

SPEAKER_03: I think it's different in our situations because you're dealing with a loss. I haven't lost anything yet, right? And so what I found was comforting to me, but more so comforting to others, is I was just very open and brutally honest about it. You know, like I wasn't gonna hide the fact that I went to go get a boob job, and that's how it was found. And I will tell anyone anything, and I felt like it helped bring uh the awkwardness or the the taboo-ness of like, oh, are you okay? How are you feeling?

SPEAKER_03: I'm like, the other day I felt like shit. Uh you know, I couldn't get out of the bed, I couldn't get off the sofa, but I'm good today, you know, and it's just the ebb and flow of it.

SPEAKER_02: And so kind of to just sort of make it where now we can have a conversation about it. Yeah. Because it kind of takes the room temperature down a little bit.

SPEAKER_03: Okay.

SPEAKER_02: And I would talk to anyone, stranger or close confidant. And that's probably different, I would think, for everybody because some people are probably a little more private.

SPEAKER_03: I had a friend that was diagnosed the day before I was, and she's like, I had posted on Facebook. I I just was like, hey, this is what's going on. And not because I wanted attention, yeah, but just like more like a breast awareness sort of thing.

SPEAKER_00: Breast awareness, yes.

SPEAKER_01: You didn't have to tell, you didn't have to explain it to a bunch of people. Yes. And then, yeah, like, hey, this is what happened. I went to get implants.

SPEAKER_03: Make sure you get your testing done or whatever. Yeah. It was a you know, public service announcement, more or less.

SPEAKER_00: We love TSA.

SPEAKER_03: Yes. But she reached out to me and she said, I was just diagnosed the day before you were. Don't tell anyone. Nobody knows. I don't want anyone to know. And I I respect that.

SPEAKER_02: Because everyone, right, everyone heals or everyone deals with the different things that happen in life. Where I'm a more open person, I'm a more transparent book. I don't, I have nothing to hide. And, you know, whatever. Life is life. But yeah, I mean, I get that. Is there's lots of people, you know, I definitely have people who are like, don't share. Take this to the take this to the this is the vault.

SPEAKER_03: Well, for me, I needed the support. Like, that's what sustained me was just knowing that I had people that I barely knew and people that I knew intimately all wrapping their arms around me. And then we could laugh about it and we could joke about it, and we could go through whatever iteration of whatever. You know, it was just I needed people to know it, you know, but I wasn't like out waving my breast cancer flag to anyone and everyone until obviously you look sick and you're bald and then you know, it's a good thing.

SPEAKER_02: And do people look at you differently? All right, because I you had like cute little head wraps. I don't know if you wore them a ton. When I first met you, people were just yeah, people are nicer.

SPEAKER_03: That's just perfect strangers and be like, what can I do? You know, and and that was nice, but I didn't expect it or want it. Yeah, but you know, it it again using humor, my husband and like, hey, you know, it's a 45-minute wait at the restaurant. Should we play the cancer card? Like, you know, but it's just the humor. Of course, we never played the cancer card trying to get into a restaurant earlier, but but uh it actually does work without even asking, you know, like oh let's sit you, right?

SPEAKER_02: Come up here, yes, right.

SPEAKER_03: But you know, I just feel like between the uh support of friends and and humor, it it really it's you can get through anything.

SPEAKER_02: Yeah, anything that's absolutely truly yeah, and this I think is important to actually cultivate a really good group of people. And that's a different episode of hey, if you look around the room and you don't feel like if you can walk through the fire, then you probably need different people. Yes. So and that's a totally different episode. We'll talk about that. So but yeah, that is you need to know that your people are gonna have your back for whatever you've got going on. Yeah, easy, big or small.

SPEAKER_01: Okay, so I was just kind of looking over our just like our notes here. Um any our last little part here is basically like um advice and takeaways. So any, I'm sorry guys, I dropped my little microphone.

SPEAKER_01: We're a very uh high class luxury uh studio here in Idaho.

SPEAKER_01: So yeah, I just want to ask if if someone listening has, you know, a friend going through let's just keep it to, you know, cancer, whatever that type may be. You know, what what would what would be your number one piece of advice and ultimately like what matters at the end of the day to you that you could relay to to people out there?

SPEAKER_03: That's a great question. So I would say if you have a friend that's diagnosed with cancer or any illness, don't ask them, is there anything I can do for you?

SPEAKER_05: Yeah, we talked about it.

SPEAKER_03: Because no one is gonna say, Yeah, actually, can you go get me a meal? And can you nobody is gonna take advantage of it?

SPEAKER_01: We just said this on our last podcast. Did you? Yeah, we we haven't released it yet, but this is was our conversation yesterday.

SPEAKER_02: Yeah, this is the big thing of right, the because it you're never gonna say, Yeah, sure, right. I would like, um great. Can you bring me a lasagna on Tuesday? Can we drop it off at 5 45? Even if it does bring some of the salad with that, you're not gonna ask for it. And while you're driving past the market, can you run in and get me some popsicle?

SPEAKER_01: I also need a bottle of Austin Hope from uh from Costco. So go ahead and put it on my porch.

SPEAKER_02: That was what we did. We talked about that, and that's where it's and again, the last episode which we're dropping, is you need to have as a girlfriend group, if you have them, if you're lucky enough to have that plan, and it's an emergency action plan that you literally, regardless of who is in the emergent state, you go into you jump in, and you're now you're all in. You just do. You're just exactly, you're just doing. And so that's part of it is no one's asking what can what do you let me know what you need.

SPEAKER_02: Yes. It's a hey, I'm dropping off X, Y, and Z. And it's one person who's reaching, it's one person coordinating the communication. So you're not overwhelmed by, let's say, the group at the moment. Yeah, you can reach out to people individually, but that it goes into kind of that was our idea of it's like having a first aid kit. It's just for emergency. It's brilliant. So yeah, exactly. Right. Yes. It's brilliant. Okay, so that that's my little that's my little TED talk for the day. So go back to right.

SPEAKER_02: So take it from there of right, don't ask anything.

SPEAKER_03: Don't ask, just do, just do. So if I have a friend in need and I am thinking of them, I can sit there and say, okay, well, I know this friend really well, and I know that they're gonna like X. If I don't know them well, I'm just gonna get them flowers and bring them by their house. Like the things that were just given to me, and it's not just the stuff, it's the thought behind the stuff. It could have been it could have been.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah. They don't, and they want to help, but then it's like kind of like a what we were you were saying before was like people want to help. So asking puts the pressure on us to make them feel like they're helping in a way where we don't even know how to even like go to like wipe our asses, you know what I mean? Like we'd like, and I'm saying, oh, okay, let me think of how I can make you comfortable so you can make me comfortable. It's an awkward thing. It's so freaking awkward.

SPEAKER_03: It's the craziest thing. And then it just stresses you out beyond the the sadness or the anxiety that you're already feeling. So be proactive as a friend and just do, just whatever you think that friend needs, even if you you don't know them well.

SPEAKER_01: You don't ask.

SPEAKER_03: Just do. Yeah. So I'd say that's the biggest thing uh in terms of support. Um, text messages were always nice, just people out of the clear blue. I agree. Uh you know, just as an example of how little it takes, but how meaningful it was. I uh back all the way back in college, 30 years ago when I graduated, um, I was playing soccer, and my coach, the assistant coach, and his wife, I became very close to, he died of cancer when I was a junior. And he was like the dad I never had. I loved him to death.

SPEAKER_03: And um, probably a bad expression. I loved him dearly. I just picked up a child. Like, uh I didn't personally love him to death, but he was an amazing man.

unknown: Yes.

SPEAKER_03: Died humor. Exactly. Yeah. Because we all die, yes. Some zoom. No one's getting out of here alive. And uh through Facebook only, I kept in touch with his wife over the many years. I I probably hadn't talked to her in 10 years before. And since I post that on Facebook, she sent me a card every single week.

SPEAKER_01: See, I love the loss of people every week.

SPEAKER_00: That is I read something the other day that said, My loss has made me.

SPEAKER_01: I had it, I put it, I posted it on my Instagram. My experience about Loss has made me a better friend to other people that have gone through loss. And I was like, ooh, I love that because it has. Until you know, you know. And you if you don't, you just don't. And it's not to any fault of anybody's. It's just, but we're all gonna go, we're all gonna experience it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03: At some point we will. And it albeit if it's if it's sudden and unexpected, like my diagnosis or your loss with Chris, or you know, if it's your 90-year-old parent who had a killer life and it's just their time to go. It's it's hard no matter what. So, but I love the idea of having if you have a if you're blessed enough to have a good group of friends like we do, having a game plan like that, I think, is really smart.

SPEAKER_02: I have a question about because obviously you're going through this, so's your family. Where did Steve get his support from?

SPEAKER_03: Oh, my husband's so extraordinary. He has a really good family. They're still married to this day. Uh his dad was just, you know, Italian immigrant, was a garbage guy in New York until he decided he was gonna go into the military, work ethic beyond anybody else, made his way up the corporate ladder when he got out of the military, put himself through school, did very well. His mother and father uh they're very devout uh in their faith. And he had a very good, I mean, his dad was very strict and maybe you know, not the disciplined type that today's generation looks fondly upon.

SPEAKER_02: Well, we're a little lighter in the world.

SPEAKER_03: I think we're a little I think we're a little lighter.

SPEAKER_02: We've gotten a little, we've probably gone a little too far. We could use a little smack upside the head, I think.

SPEAKER_03: He received some of that, uh, and he was just he's just very disciplined, and uh you know, all he's ever wanted was a wife and children. And right, you know, he he's just a kind, loving I think it's just an eight. I he was raised really well, but I think his father's a loving husband, right? He's the glue, he's the glue in his family. He's got two other brothers, and you know, they're they're all very different personalities.

SPEAKER_02: So they come really like wrap their arms around because was this the first like diagnosis, let's say, of any type of illness in the family? Yes.

SPEAKER_03: Okay. I wouldn't say that his brothers the the they did in their own way, I guess. Not are they like say emotionally close? No. Okay, they're brothers. They they used to be okay. They used to be yeah. I mean, no, yeah, families. Families are whole we've got families have got a whole. There's a bunch of personalities. I mean, they all like each other. Everyone's human, they're all very different.

SPEAKER_05: All right.

SPEAKER_02: So brothers, so who who rallied around to support him? Or did no one like is his parents were incredible? And his group of friends? Yes. Did he tell his friends, obviously?

SPEAKER_03: You know, my husband doesn't have a lot of close friends. Okay. Um his friend from high school, the the proctology a procologist. Oh, a rectal surgeon. Okay, yes. Same body part. Okay, absolutely. He he was incredible and you know he probably was constantly checking. He doesn't have a lot of close friends, uh, which is a good thing.

SPEAKER_02: But that's a good friend to have because he's in that he lives with that, breathes that obviously maybe different body part, but yeah, he was astute enough to be sort of know what he's obviously going through because he sees it in other capacities. Yes. And you know, I'm not saying right, and that's with men, that's a whole other thing, is you don't have to have you just need to have, let's say, one or two, or even just have a beautiful spouse like you. I mean, I just think men have a different level of support, but they do.

SPEAKER_02: And you know, we never sort of talk about that.

SPEAKER_01: I don't feel like with Steve, like you were um worried about what he was worried about and you were trying to like console him at all. I just wondered.

SPEAKER_03: Another great question. Yeah, I thought that I would have to do that. Yeah. And uh, you know, most men are not very um emotional, right? Um, but we he we we dubbed him weepy Steve. Really? Because we'd be sitting at dinner, you know, maybe a month in, and we'd be talking about it or not talking about it, and all of a sudden he would just start crying. And oh my god, it's like when you guys cry, you just start. You constantly start crying. He's like, I'm so sorry, weepy Steve is coming. I'm like, it's okay, you're allowed to have a lot of things.

SPEAKER_02: And I mean, but kudos to Steve for having the emotional intelligence to be able to do that, yeah, and not go, let's say, crying in the other room. That's a bonding thing for you.

SPEAKER_01: It was like the safety aspect of your relationship for him to be able to do that. I imagine most men, I mean, I'm just speaking generally of what we know about men in general, not being emotional, like they're probably freaking out inside, not showing the emotion.

SPEAKER_03: So that's another I loved his vulnerability with it all because he's going through it in a totally different way than you're going through it, but he you're his love, yeah, you're his life.

SPEAKER_01: Yes, and and what and what did it do for your relationship?

SPEAKER_03: I tell I have said this to a handful of people that have asked that great question. I would not trade my diagnosis for anything.

SPEAKER_01: I would not. I say, and I'm not saying at all what I ever want to wish anybody ever losing a spouse on them at all. Like the the journey is walking literally straight through a inferno. But where I what I've learned, where it's got me, what I've learned about my marriage, my past, like our even just like down to our arguments or our relationship, like what I will either tolerate going forward or what I care about now. Like, there's just so much that I'm like, I will never die on that hill. Like today, I'm like for a recording.

SPEAKER_01: I'm like, well, let's just do it. It's like we had some technical difficulties, like we always do, Killery and I. And I forgot my Macbook. So I was the type B friend today. So I'm so sorry. I love you. I'm sorry.

SPEAKER_02: There's no, and that's the thing though, but I think that's I mean, I'm innately a type B anyway. And sometimes a C and I'm sometimes I'm a D, as Monica knows, because today we carried a box up my stairs, which is in my hallway for a month, maybe a month, right? Maybe Potteryburn sent something a month ago, and I'm like, blankets, nothing hard. Open the box, take him upstairs. But that's me. As I'm like, I didn't, I mean, if we did this today, awesome. If we didn't do it today, fine. Life isn't changing.

SPEAKER_02: Yes.

SPEAKER_01: Your perspective was gonna be my next question. Like, what did it do for you and Steve? Brought you closer, obviously, allowed him to grieve, and you didn't feel like you had to carry him while you were doing that.

SPEAKER_03: No, I didn't, not once. And and I I don't feel and he'll probably agree with me. I don't feel like he ever had to carry me either. Yeah, it was a very symbiotic thing that I think you know, 26, 7, 8, 9 years of marriage helps, you know, if you but you live more time with that person than you. Yeah, but there was a depth to our relationship that we achieved that I don't maybe we we would have gotten there.

SPEAKER_01: That's what I say about like our when after Chris died, like the death or your diagnosis with cancer or Maddie's autoimmune, anything like that. But like the amount of depth that it brings to friendships and relationships and the amount of eye-opening it does to what really matters in this world is like wild to me. It's almost like we are I don't even want to say the word bless, but we're like so lucky to have to go through these experiences because then we it's almost like we get this like blessing.

SPEAKER_03: It's an epiphany.

SPEAKER_01: It's an epiphany, it's like a blessing that you get to live with in your friend group. Or, I mean, you know, as a diagnosis or diagnosis or losing Chris, I feel like I don't know, it's not I'm not better than anybody else. I just know that I live my life now completely different. Like you will never see me sweating the small stuff, like ever in a million years. Right. And I feel blessed for that because look at how many people have never gone through anything serious, and they're like upset about like their TV breaking or whatever, you know.

SPEAKER_03: I'm like, buy another one, get one and we go about our day, day in and day out, yeah, not thinking about dying or getting sick or the possibility of dying. And then when you're really faced with it or it happens, and you do get a chance to go on. In your case, you know, you're living the legacy of Chris, and and I'm still here kicking. And I think I'm not wasting any more time worrying about those silly things, they're just not important. I know.

SPEAKER_02: They're just not, and there really are so very few things that are so important. Yes, right. There really are. I mean, I can't think of anything. And it's Chris, it's some connections. Yeah, it's all the other stuff. Yeah, laughs. It's like this is the worst thing that's gonna happen in my day. Well, I'm fucking so lucky. I am so lucky. This is this is the problem I have. Big whoop.

SPEAKER_01: Or it's just like the I like if you we start to complain, because I do, we all do, then I'm like, okay, like snap out, like get a hold of yourself. And it happens fast, it happens very fast. I mean, we can go downhill very fast, but I I also think I'm and we'll we'll help each other, like absolutely like no right. Come on, moving on. Right. Let's go. We'll go to another restaurant. The waits too long, let's not be pissed about it.

SPEAKER_02: Let's get their drink.

SPEAKER_01: They don't have any each type of wine. Uh-huh. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: It's Tuesday. Let's go out. It's Tuesday. Let's go for St. Patrick's Day. Let's not do that.

unknown: Yeah.

SPEAKER_02: So have you had any friends get diagnosed since you got diagnosed? Oh, I don't know. Okay, so no one's reached out and said, besides that one friend who said, Hey, I've got at the same time, okay. She is doing okay.

SPEAKER_03: She had triple negative, which is also aggressive, but it was a totally different path. Uh, she opted for radiation. I did not want radiation. I said, cut those girls off and let's start fresh. Because I was like, Well, I'm gonna get them, I'm gonna get implants again anyway, so I might as well get rid of. I did not want to uh think about the prospect of because I was scheduled originally just to have one breast done. Okay, and I thought, and then I'm talking to my surgeon, she's like, we can do both of them if you want.

SPEAKER_03: And I said, Yeah. Does that eliminate, for example, going forward any chance? Not altogether, okay, but it drastically reduces your chance of of having breasts.

SPEAKER_02: Can you go back now? Because I know you just got your last immunotherapy treatment. Was yesterday? What's today? Yes. Tuesday. Today's Tuesday. Yes, it was yesterday. Yes.

SPEAKER_01: Oh, it's amazing.

SPEAKER_02: It was my last port out. I get my port out in another week. And then you go, what's the what's the treatment plan from here on out?

SPEAKER_03: I'm on oral um hormone blockers because mine was hormone driven. Okay. So, you know, we talk about hormones and all these things. I'm I'm almost envious in a way because you know, you're talking about, oh, I gotta have my testosterone. Right, no testosterone. And I'm like, I can't, I I can't. I have to have on blockers.

SPEAKER_02: Well, the good news is everything like a little dynamo fitness brewer over there. So no, I feel like I'm an 85-year-old woman. Every joint is a little bit more. She literally looks like she's 20 years old with this hot little bod. So no, you know what? You get hotter, and I'm gonna be pissed on you. You don't get anything else.

SPEAKER_03: Well, I still look like a boy with my short hair.

SPEAKER_02: You're it's growing back in so cute. Oh god. And anywhere we go, the people stop her and say how adorable her hair is. She looks so cute.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you are so cute. Oh, you guys are nice. Um I'm just trying to roll with it. No, you're so good. Well, okay, so I guess some of our just uh maybe a couple last questions and wrapping up. Um, what do you want people to take away from your story?

SPEAKER_03: Um, I want them, women, to make sure you are doing every be your own advocate. Make sure you are getting your exams, please. I have a friend that said she has never had one. You're 50 years old.

SPEAKER_01: I just had my best friend in the whole wide world from California today. Um, I won't say her name, but she got her. Um see, I have to be careful.

SPEAKER_02: Um I'm so proud of you.

SPEAKER_01: Yesterday was her colonoscopy. And she is 50, like three. Yeah, not the thing is it's not. You're supposed to get it at 45 now. Yes, it's not just not just breast problems.

SPEAKER_02: It's all the extreme. She was scared.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, she was scared. I mean, her grandma died of colorectal cancer, and she was just scared.

SPEAKER_02: And so And now she realizes it was no big deal.

SPEAKER_01: Well, because we went together, and the best little nap of those. Just so you know, Hillary and I went and got our colonoscopies together. Oh, that's very on the same day.

SPEAKER_00: Yes.

SPEAKER_01: The girl other girlfriends drove us, same guy.

SPEAKER_00: We were a half hour apart. Um, and that was some closeness. I mean, we were. Oh, we we did the cleanse together. We did the cleanse together, and we're the worst part, isn't it? Oh, I told my girlfriend.

SPEAKER_01: I said we shared all the experiences. I think my point was like, thank you so much for doing that so that I could be your friend for a longer period of time. Yes. Like, thank you for doing that. So that's because I want you to live longer. I want you to live longer. Yeah, and you yeah, you yeah.

SPEAKER_03: So that is the first thing. Make sure you are just doing all the things that we're told we need to do. Don't put it off. Yeah, just don't make time for it. You can make time for scrolling on your phone for 45 minutes to an hour or maybe six hours is what I average, apparently. Go to your doctor.

SPEAKER_01: What I do have a I do have a like a little sidebar question. Had the plastic surgeon not found that tissue and you just kept getting your annual exams, breast like your breast exams, like you normally did. Has has anybody ever said to you, like, we wouldn't have been able to detect it in a in a mammogram or a 3D for maybe five more years? Because then it would have been stage three, or have you not even gone there? Like, I'm glad they found it, of course, now, but I just wonder, like, how you go and go every year, but there's still undetected cancer.

SPEAKER_03: There is, there is, and I'm so glad you asked that too, because I have been telling now that I'm aware of all the things that are out there, there's so much better technology, even past the 3D mammograms. Yeah, get an ultrasound. If the ultrasound shows something, get an MRI. Yeah. I have another MRI coming up in another couple weeks. The 3D mammograms won't always catch it.

SPEAKER_00: Yeah.

SPEAKER_03: The regular mammograms certainly won't catch it.

SPEAKER_00: That's what I feel like they're they say. They're like old school now. Does it ever get caught though?

SPEAKER_02: Because some of the people who I've known who've had cancer different ones, they got caught through their blood work. Now, granted, one with stage four, and that was terrible. My mom's got caught early, early, and that was through a blood. She had broken a shoulder riding her horse, and it had healed, and they were doing something, blood work came back, and hers was caught, they think, probably seven years before she would have had symptoms. Oh, okay. That's what I was really early because hers was really slow growing.

SPEAKER_02: Wow. But it was blood work. So at some point, does it not? I don't know. So that's like a slot, and that's why I started.

SPEAKER_03: That's where my medical knowledge, like sure, you know, again, that kind of goes along with get your physicals, yeah. Do all the blood work. Get your blood work. Be on time, do it. It doesn't take it.

SPEAKER_02: Once a year, whether it's your birthday month, yeah, whether it's a new year, schedule. Get in a routine to stop. Get in a routine. And and encourage your and girlfriends, and then do it together. Do it together. Do it together. Go book the mammograms together.

SPEAKER_03: If you can do it, if you can book it at the same time, yeah, it turns into a good story. Right, it turns into a girl day, right? Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: You didn't want to go like you were like, I'm I'm gonna do it. I didn't want to do it. You shouldn't want to do it.

SPEAKER_02: I'm gonna I don't need anything like going up my butt.

SPEAKER_01: Like I'm like, we're no we're doing it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02: No, I don't, right? Who is this person? And then I looked up, I'm like, oh, you're not cute. Okay, cool. You can totally look it up. You have to have the very unattractive doctors. That is the big thing with me. I have to look up who the person is. I'm like, oh, you're cute.

SPEAKER_03: No, that's not gonna work. Well, I need to listen to my own advice because I've been in Idaho now for five years and I have not had my I have not seen an OB in five years.

SPEAKER_05: Okay.

SPEAKER_03: So I'm I need to practice what I preach in that regard, but now I'm I'm more awake. I mean yes. You know, I've been preoccupied this year, this past year. So the other thing I would add is if you are diagnosed with an illness, or if your family member is, or your best friend, or your great friend has a loss, try to uh try to approach it with humor. Find the the joy.

SPEAKER_02: I've heard you say this so much. And that did not feel offensive if someone was kind of because I think that's the hard part is this is where you get a little stuck of you want to say something, but I tend to have more humor.

SPEAKER_01: And like we know you have to know the audience, yeah. You know, you have to know the person that yeah for your.

SPEAKER_02: No, or diminish.

SPEAKER_03: But for yourself, if you're going through it, yeah, for yourself. For yourself, okay, gotcha. Find the laughter. So I'm not sure of like, hey, you got the answer.

SPEAKER_02: So how's that ball?

SPEAKER_03: Okay, no. I'm doing it for yourself, not for the girlfriends don't show. Yeah. Because laughter just makes you feel better. Yes. You know, and even if you're just feeling like crap, if you can find a chuckle here and there, it just it the one thing that Steve would do that just killed me in such a good way. So they told us when I would start chemo, they're like, make sure she doesn't use you don't use the same toilet because her urine has toxin toxins in it. If it splatters on the toilet, wipe it all down.

SPEAKER_03: And he's like, I'm and I said, please just do it. So for a while I was doing it, but we have speakers throughout our house, and so he started um doing like an air raid siren every time I went pee, you know, like Chernobyl, uh like a toxic thing, and I would just sit there and laugh, even though I wanted to cry. Yeah, you know, and it was like I needed that.

SPEAKER_00: I needed like how can you possibly get through this life without laughter? You can't.

SPEAKER_03: No, no, it makes so much easier, it makes everything so much easier.

SPEAKER_00: It's just a little lighter, yeah.

SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah. So it you know, even in your dark moments, if you're just feeling like crap or you just don't want to get out of bed, yeah. If there's something that you can just go, you know, even a chuckle.

SPEAKER_01: I do that a lot. I talk to Chris a lot in our house still, and I either curse his name because I'm mad, he's not here to change out the smoke alarm, or but I just laugh about like something uh, you know, just silly, like about the grass or like the closet, like everything's still in the closet, and I'm like, dude, can you come and move this shit? Because this is like too much for me. Like your chon stinky chonies, like whatever, like your you know, your shoes with holes in them. Like, I'm like not, can you come and do this shit?

SPEAKER_01: Because I don't want to do it. So, yes, you have to like have that, you know. You have to have that, you have to be able to put the humor into yourself, like you know, even when not other people, but I mean you do kind of gravitate towards the friend group that can also do that. It lifts you up, and you know, as we found when we went on our girls' trip, we clearly are all in sync. Yes, we're slightly in sync, yes, for the most part.

SPEAKER_02: So basically, thank you for joining us. Thank you for sharing your story anytime. Monica will back on for many more things because she's amazing, and there's so much more I want to talk to you about.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you guys need to do an episode on like decorating on a budget and like and I want to talk to both of you as someone who could not get past obviously the obstacle in my marriage.

SPEAKER_02: That was I mean, there's no getting past that. But for people who were married long term, met young, met college, early 20s, you guys went through all the fires together to come on the other side. That's a conversation I definitely want to have. I mean, I'm in a happily married beautiful 14-year relationship, 10-year married. But I I couldn't get I couldn't have to be a good idea.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I mean you already you already talked about, you know, being you're you know, some difficult times with both of us getting through difficulty. I mean, geez, we were on the fritz plenty of times. Yeah, you know.

SPEAKER_02: So those will be we're gonna do a whole this is a whole friendship series, and this is sort of all part of them. But I would say my biggest takeaway just from hearing all this is for all the people listening who have friends who are walking through anything hard. Doesn't maybe have to be an illness, whatever is going on in life. It could be loss of a job right now, it could be kids going off to college. Now, granted, we're like kids are probably about to come back, but whatever the things are that's going on is I would say, right, you as we all say, showing up doesn't require perfection, it just requires presence.

SPEAKER_05: Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02: So show up for your friends in the best way that you possibly can, and just know that they are appreciative of any flowers left, any card sent, any text message that you are acknowledging whatever it is that they're walking through. So so thank you for listening, everyone. Thank you, Monica. We love you girls.

SPEAKER_00: We'll talk to you all next time. Yeah, thanks for for joining us.

SPEAKER_02: Thank you.

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