Review: Breast Cancer Memoir

This week I spent my non-querying hours reading the memoir entitled Eating Pomegranates:  A Memoir Of Mothers, Daughters, And The BRCA Gene by Sarah Gabriel.  Undoubtedly, this is the most intense and vivid breast cancer memoir I have ever read.  Mrs. Gabriel does not sugarcoat the process from diagnosis, treatment, and recovery and I appreciated that kind of take on a subject like breast cancer as my own mom has suffered from it as well.  This particular memoir is written from both a personal patient experience and a historical perspective so the reader is learning not only about Mrs. Gabriel's experiences as a BRCA1 breast cancer survivor, but also quite a few historical elements about the discovery and treatment of breast cancer from the 16th, 17th, and 18the centuries. 

The book begins with the knowledge that the author has a family history of female cancers including her inheritance of the BRCA1 gene from her mother's side of the family.  The author lost her mother to ovarian cancer while she was away at Oxford.  Her mother was only 42 years of age at the time and it was a very hush-hush affair.  The author's father was left with five children to raise and he firmly believed in coping via a stiff upper lip and no disclosure of mourning.  The father begins living with his second wife just ten weeks after the death of Mrs. Gabriel's mother.  Subsequently, Mrs. Gabriel learns another cousin has died of breast cancer on her mother's side of the family.  She actually discovers the lump in her breast before the doctor or xray does.  She brings it to the attention of her doctor and immediately she winds up having an ultrasound done where it is discovered Mrs. Gabriel has six tumors.  Following a biopsy we learn that three of the tumors are malignant, but none of the six tumors have reached the lymph nodes.

Then there is the process of whether she should have just one breast removed or both and in what manner should she have them removed.  Does she wish to have breast reconstruction after about a year?  Mrs. Gabriel does extremely well in communicating her fear of passing this genetic inheritance on to her own daughters and the anxiety with which her family is riddled while she undergoes surgery and then six rounds of chemotherapy.  Her young daughters fully realize something is wrong with their mother and that it is not good.  Mrs. Gabriel seeks the counsel of someone to figure out how to tell her daughters what is about to happen to her and beautifully describes the concept of cancer to them. 

The author has great fear of dying and leaving her daughters without a mother.  Her husband already has his hands full trying to handle the home, school, work, and medical appointments with his wife.  They hire a nanny, but the nanny never takes the time with the children that a mother would.  There is a great rift between the author and her father who appears to be such a fickle man; at once not wishing to bring up any mention of her mother for twenty years and then also keeping the author's children while she has surgery.  There is a realistic portrayal in this memoir about the grossness of chemotherapy.  Interestingly, Mrs. Gabriel is constantly spoken to by other mothers and acquaintances as she walks her daughters to school, but most of these same people are frightened of her reality; of the very real mortality she is facing.  They subsequently keep telling her to "put one foot in front of the other" and "stay positive".  You never see these individuals really every truly reaching out to help Mrs. Gabriel or her family which is quite sad.

The reader also is invited into the lives of a network of cancer survivors in a support group setting.  Personally, I think this is where Mrs. Gabriel feels least alone because these cancer victims relate to her state of being physically, emotionally, and mentally.  Some of them are worse off than she and others are at an earlier stage in their treatment process for cancer than the author currently is.  By the conclusion, Mrs. Gabriel finally has a long discussion about her mother's death with her father and she realizes that even though her daughters have suffered tremendously during this anxiety filled time, they are stronger people for having been through this along with their mother.  The only really true thing we have to hold on to when mortality comes calling in the form of cancer is the love we have for those closest to us.  The people who will be there come what may which is all too often our immediate family members.  The love we have for them and the love they have for us is what keeps us going in such a dastardly time; it's what makes life worth living.