Catherine Gigante-Brown

My husband and I agreed: raising a child with an independent spirit who made decisions for himself was a good thing.

After I got over the initial devastation, I pulled myself up by my big-girl panties and got on with it. Chemo was no picnic—but it was do-able.

Upset you lost your keys? Try losing your breast. Pissed off about missing that train? Try missing your son’s 8th grade graduation because of a horrific infection from fluid buildup in the previously-mentioned missing breast. See what I mean? It kind of puts life into perspective.

I sat obediently in her chair atop four ancient copies of the Yellow Pages. Crossing my fingers, I prayed Catholic schoolgirl prayers.

Candida Royalle pretty much invented couples erotica. She made it socially-acceptable. Respectable. The women in her films looked like real women and had real, comfortable female bodies. And her movies actually had stories. Good stories. She hired her friends—adult legends like Annie Sprinkle, Veronicas Hart and Vera, and Gloria Leonard — to create Femme films too.

"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."

I know it’s not a politically correct one, but I’ve got a confession to make: earth-friendly hotels stink. There, I said it.

BCBs are loud and proud and refuse to go down easy. And quietly. We have things to say. We have things to teach. We still have life to live. And damn it, we are and we will. With one breast. With no breasts. With reconstruction surgery.

I go for checkups when I’m supposed to: every three months to the oncologist and every six months to the breast surgeon. I go to SHARE support group meetings to bolster myself. I try to get enough sleep, despite the occasional night spent wide-eyed with dread.

“It’s almost as though this niche was patiently waiting for us to find it.”