Sarah E. McDonald

“Mommy. I keep all of my magic in my heart. Is that where you keep yours?”

I am sitting with my girl across my lap on the dense, cozy rug in front of our couch. It is mid-afternoon and I have picked her up early from her after school program so that she can have the just-Mommy-and-Rory time she had asked for this morning on our drive to school…

The week following the FNA (fine needle aspiration), I was preparing for a two-day offsite with Devin’s senior leadership team. We would kick off the event with a dinner at a fancy steakhouse and then spend Thursday and Friday hammering through the agenda Devin and I had agreed upon. It was to be my first time in charge of an offsite for the leadership team, and I was eager to do it well…

Dr. BreastOnc called me three days later to ask if Geoff and I were available to meet with her. She said she had some things she wanted to discuss with us prior to beginning treatments.

We met Dr. BreastOnc in the same room we had met with the team of doctors to discuss my diagnosis and potential treatment plan. I was perched on the examining table again and Geoff was to my right in one of the two metal chairs in the room. Just as she had the first day, Dr. BreastOnc walked into the room, walked up to me, and…

My friend Tripti has a special room in her home for her yoga practice. It is a serene room where once you close the door, all sounds from her home disappear. You cannot hear her Bernese Mountain Dog, Otis, bounding up and down the stairs or playing with his stuffed toys. You cannot hear her husband, Todd, tapping away at the computer or running a conference call or trying to find the words to tell my husband who has come with me how sorry he is that I have cancer…