Cancer Schmancer by Fran Drescher Page A

witness or sounding board for my parents’ endless worrying over my sister. In a desire not to give them any more cause for worry, or perhaps out of a competitive need to be the “good one,”
    a lifelong pattern of self-denial, of not expressing my needs, of giving rather than taking, became my M.O.
    Even as an adult, after I moved to California and was married to Peter, I hardly had a conversation with my mother that wasn’t dominated by worries about my sister. First there was the issue that she wasn’t married; then it was leaving her alone when my parents moved to Florida. These days, it’s how hard she works while trying to raise two kids. It’s always something, and because it’s always been something, I think it prevented Nadine and I from experiencing the closeness I envied in other siblings.
    Consequently, I’d never opened my eyes to see how much I had in common with her. We both were successful, career-driven women. We both loved to travel and hike. We both loved culture, theater, and museums. We loved restaurants, all different 9377 Cancer Schmancer 2/28/02 4:18 PM Page 85
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    kinds of foods and entertaining. We could have been best friends, but unfortunately, that friendship we should have been sharing our entire lives was something we’d missed out on.
    So it was my sister, Nadine, on the phone. Now, in all the time I was experiencing symptoms and searching for a diagnosis, I’d never once picked up the phone and reached out to her, an experienced nurse married to a doctor. What an idiot. How stupid of me, but asking for help wasn’t in my vocabulary.
    “How ya doin’?” she asked with concern.
    “Ya know, I’ve been better,” was all I could answer. I really didn’t know how I was doing or what I was feeling, but I guess numb would have been a more appropriate answer.
    “When do you see the surgeon?” She sounded businesslike.
    “Um, Friday, not until Friday.” I felt whipped, sapped of my strength.
    “Did they grade the tumor, any mention of a letter or number?” She sounded like a nurse, my nurse.
    “All she said was that it was very early, very slow growing, and very noninvasive.” By soft-pedaling it, I hoped to convince myself it was hardly anything. The fact that it was indeed cancer was merely incidental. I still needed to be the shtarkar, the workhorse everyone else had come to depend on.
    “Next time you talk to her, try to get a grade number, too,” she said, as I wrote everything down on a list of things to remember to ask the surgeon on Friday.
    “Okay,” I answered.
    “I’d also feel a lot better if the surgeon did her own biopsy.”
    My sister was now in full medical mode. I’d never seen her in action before, and I regretted that I hadn’t turned to her sooner.
    “So I should tell her I want her to do another D&C?”
    “Yes, definitely. The gynecologist took it in her office. Now 9377 Cancer Schmancer 2/28/02 4:18 PM Page 86
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    you’re working with a surgeon in a hospital. It’s a more controlled environment, and I always like it when the surgeon starts fresh with her own tests. I think it’s better.” She was pretty insistent.
    “All right, I’ll tell her. I’m going to call her tomorrow and I’ll tell her.” I was glad my sister was now in the loop. She cared about me. She loved me, I could trust her to do right by me.
    “Do you want Mom and Dad to cancel their trip to see me and the kids so they can be with you?” she asked. Did she know how hard a question that was for me to answer? I hemmed and hawed, then said, “Um, I don’t know what I want.” All I knew was, I didn’t want to be the sick one, the weak one, the needy one. That was never my role, not in my entire life. Was I supposed to totally shift gears because of one call from my doctor?
    “If you want them to come to you, they’ll cancel their trip.”
    Her voice began to escalate. “Is that what you want?”
    “I don’t want them