Videos

The list of things to do before starting chemo includes the seemingly ordinary task of getting a “port” or “medi-port.” Get your blood work, pick up groceries, wash the car, get a port… But port placement is actually surgery and being unprepared for the procedure can result in some pretty…

Six weeks after the (evil) expanders are out and new 700cc “porn-star-sized” breast implants are in, Kristen shares what it feels like to be on the other side of the painfully long process of stretching her skin to make room for the permanent replacements. After falling into the bushes while…

Natasha Curry is not your everyday average nurse. As a palliative care nurse practitioner at San Francisco General Hospital, she cares for the poorest and most vulnerable at what is often the most challenging time of their lives. Many patients are homeless and also struggling with substance abuse and mental…

As a nurse, you never truly understand the level of terror your patients are experiencing until you become one yourself. New York Times best-selling author Theresa Brown, RN, shares her breast cancer treatment journey along with details about her new book, “Healing.” Diagnosed with breast cancer in fall of 2017,…

It’s the day after Kristen’s surgery to replace her expanders with permanent breast implants, and she’s already feeling much better. For the last 33 weeks, Kristen lived with a constant 2-4 pain level from the uncomfortable and awkward expanders. Today her chest looks normal again, even if it will never…

It’s the night before Kristen’s implant exchange surgery. After 9 long months, the painful, lopsided tissue expanders will be replaced with silicone gel breast implants and her constant pain will come to an end. At her pre-op appointment with Dr. Pacella, Kristen imagines choosing the new boobs will be like…

Nobody told Kristen just how horrible the side effects from the hormone blockers would be. The neuropathy in her feet causes her to walk like an old woman and she struggles with simple, everyday movement like standing up from the couch or walking up stairs. To combat calcium loss from…

Kristen returns to Austin during the holidays to help a friend recover from surgery, clear out the last of her old things from the storage unit, and close the door on 26 years of her life. A stinky side effect leads us to invent a new dance move, and in…

In part 2 of our conversation with plastic surgeon Dr. Salvatore Pacella, we go behind the doors of the operating room to understand how the team functions and learn some surprising things about surgery. Looking back on Kristen’s extraordinary pain in the hours following surgery, we get real answers about…

Kristen’s plastic surgeon Dr. Salvatore Pacella joins us to deconstruct her breast reconstruction and help us understand his strategy for the multi-stage approach in which the expanders are placed at the time of mastectomy and replaced with breast implants following radiation. We ask all the unanswered burning questions, including whether…

Two months after radiation, Kristen’s chest isn’t looking like such a hot mess anymore. But in mental health terms, we’re in the valley now and nobody knows how deep or wide that valley will be. Kristen learns the hard way what happens if she misses a dose or two of…

Despite increasing pain and burns from the most recent round of radiation, Kristen manages to keep up with work and spend time with a friend at the beach. With only five days left until the end of radiation and “no evidence of disease,” surely there’s a celebration in store? On…

Weary and desperate for a break in the relentlessness of breast cancer treatment, Kristen makes the decision whether or not to proceed with radiation. While the medical team followed a tight protocol during chemo and surgery, suddenly now to receive advice, statistics, or data she has to ask the right…

Kristen goes into the operating room hopeful that this milestone is the end of her cancer, but wakes up ten hours later realizing the number of drains in her chest means the worst possible outcome. The next morning she learns that 11 lymph nodes were removed for testing, which means…

How do you prepare to have a part of your body removed forever? What snacks do you bring to a double mastectomy? For Kristen, the list starts with a good pillowcase, her Anna Ono robe, her softest Kyte Baby jammies, slippers, her YETI cup, and shirts with places for drains.…

Kristen readies herself for the impending double mastectomy and reflects on her original thought process in which the bad old boobs are swapped for good new boobs and that’s the end. While watching Nightbirde, a young, single woman with cancer on America’s Got Talent, she realizes that the absence of…

Kristen is exhausted and ready to be done with chemo. When Scripps' entire computer system goes down from a ransomware attack, her appointments come to a screeching halt. A chemotherapy session is delayed by a day, but the frustration is short-lived as she realizes her brother can be there to…

After 11 long weeks of chemotherapy we’re at the clinic to see Dr. Ali, the oncologist. Kristen is hopeful because she can see her tumor and it appears on the surface like it’s getting smaller. But the only true measure of whether the tumor has grown is the MRI, and…

Kristen adjusts to Taxol, the drug used in the second phase of chemotherapy, which brings bizarre side effects requiring special booties and mittens to prevent permanent nerve damage in her hands and feet. Her beachfront living arrangement is upended, and while moving is stressful, her home is replaced with an…

4 weeks after starting chemo, the “new normal” is here. Kristen describes what it feels like to have no hair and as the physical effects of chemo present new challenges, she realizes that breast cancer could be what ends her life. Kristen’s ongoing determination to quickly learn as much as…

At the end of the day following Kristen’s 2nd chemo treatment, she recalls her dream the previous night and describes how her hair hurts. Between the first and second chemo treatments, several surprise infections appeared along with disappointment over how quickly her formerly iron-clad immune system failed. While adjusting to…