Suzanne Blanchard
In memory of her daughter
Suzanne Blanchard (right) enrolled in the STAR trial in memory of her daughter Bambi (left).
I never expected my lovely daughter to teach me how to die, with such courage, grace, and love.
It all began with a call from Bambi, a 37-year-old mother of three, anxiously saying that overnight her breast had doubled in size. This had happened while she was on a field trip to Washington, DC, during the spring of 1998, with her son Peter. After speaking to her doctor, he told her that it was probably just an infection, and antibiotics were prescribed. After two days, the swelling and pain were worse. With Bambi's insistence, a biopsy was scheduled. We all had trouble waiting those few days before the procedure was due, but we played over and over in our minds what her doctor had said and that it was very likely nothing to worry about.
The diagnosis, unfortunately, was everything to worry about. Inflammatory breast cancer, a rare disease that claims the lives of nearly all its victims in three to eighteen months, often having metastasized before being discovered. In my daughter's case, the cancer had spread through most of the bones in her body. This type of breast cancer is indeed so rare that Bambi's doctor in Dartmouth had never seen another such patient in his practice. On that lovely April day, the deep, raw wounds carved by that doctor's words changed life forever for her and all of us in the family.
At first, her war seemed so easy. With gentle determination and ease, she slid through the chemo and radiation. With a mixture of fear and courage, she survived the three weeks of hospitalization and imprisonment of her stem cell transplant, which brought her success with a brief remission. With sadness and even a bit of anger, she occupied too much of her time with phone calls and letters to her insurance company, which, surprisingly to all of us, became another battleground. With love and humor, Bambi attended the school functions of her three young children and the many family get-togethers joking about her wigs, her bruised arms, and her high-necked bathing suits. Even at the end of her battle, when she was facing gruesome fatigue and heightened pain after eighteen months of her illness, she kept that beautiful smile and her faith- even during her final three days when her family and friends came to say goodbye, telling her of their love and respect, as she rested in her home.
Indeed, it is for my daughter, first of all, that I wanted to take part in STAR. During the progression of her cancer, she had allowed the doctors to take extra bone marrow tests and other procedures for research, enduring additional pain, but hoping that further knowledge of her cancer could be found. I'll never forget the brightness of Bambi's smile when I told her I had been accepted in this trial. "That's great, Mom. I'm proud of you!"
Secondly, it is also for the many dedicated, wonderful doctors and nurses at Dana-Farber in Boston, that I wanted to continue her desire to find more answers to the many questions we still have about breast cancer. The staff treated Bambi with such skill and kindness, especially her key physician, Dr. Hal Burstein. He made her feel so special, so unique, and so loved. As Hal walked with her on that dreadful path to death, we could hear in his every word and step an echo of our sorrow and loss that one so kind, so exceptional, was not to be saved.
Yes, participating in STAR, I am hoping to be a small part of the army, which is now fighting this war. All of us, I'm sure, hope to enable doctors to find the knowledge, which will allow our granddaughters, daughters, mothers, aunts, and friends to hear the words, "Breast cancer - no longer a problem!" With this joined determination, we will be the victors!