Catherine Gigante-Brown

"Remember, this isn’t just happening to you, it’s happening to moms everywhere. It’s not your fault — "

The office cubicle is indeed a strange bird. Here's how to survive life in a box without driving you—or your office mates—crazy.

I was 21 –– a Catholic, heterosexual college student, living at home in Brooklyn and still trying to discover who I was. At the crossroads of her life, Lorde knew exactly who she was. She was waging a war against cancer and sharing an old house in Staten Island with her kids and partner. But maybe we weren’t so different after all.

I’m sure you’ll find it a delicious and well-stocked place. There are just a few rules

"I was afraid this thing was going to do me in. But I took a deep breath and decided very early on that I would face cancer on my own terms."

Mindel and Maria were young teenagers when the horrors occurred—but they remembered the tiniest details with crystal-clear intensity.

We’ve pieced ourselves back together in a patchwork quilt of ragged emotions. The aftermath of 9/11 wasn’t easy for us, yet it was much easier than for some. People standing 50 feet away from Peter didn’t come home that night; he did.

The Daily News quoted one painted lady as saying, “People come up to us sometimes and say what we do is disgusting,” she said. “But what is disgusting about the female body? They shield their kids sometimes, and I think, ‘Kids come from the female body.’”

That’s the thing about being a breast cancer survivor — it’s always there: it never goes away. The scars, the fear that lurks in the back of your mind like a boogeyman. You’re going along nicely, living your merry life, and you’re fine, until you’re not.

You learn a lot about people when you live in their home. The Taylors seemed to lead a joyless, Spartan existence.