Columns

At a recent appointment, a doctor told me something I’ve heard many times before: “You know what you should really consider? Genetic testing!” He was scanning my chart, reading some of the details aloud, such as my father’s diagnosis at age 50 with stage 4 colon cancer. Also in…

On the most recent episode of CBS News’ “60 Minutes,” President Joe Biden declared the pandemic over. I wish I could be writing with champagne in hand and firecrackers crackling at a party that, yes, an endless future of indoor gatherings is in sight. But that image of…

There is never an ideal way to encounter survivor’s guilt. It’ll be foisted upon you like a dumpster on your front porch. It’s unnecessary baggage that you didn’t know you’d have to carry, but now it’s here. I think it’s ultimately a selfish feeling, but sometimes we all have selfish…

Every day for countless years now, my routine has been the same. I take a handful of meds with breakfast and dinner, the cocktail of which ebbs and flows, and digestive enzymes with all of my meals. Like most people with a lifetime of chronic illness under their belt,…

In a 1993 commercial for Nike, NBA star and 1992 Olympics hero Charles Barkley declared, “I am not a role model.” The commercial was controversial and garnered backlash, but Barkley was right. He wasn’t a role model. Although a lot of the country, myself included, adore Barkley’s ability…

(Spoiler alert: It’s yours.) A writer friend of mine regularly reminds her memoir students: “If you drive your friend to get an abortion, that’s your story, the story of you driving your friend to get an abortion.” The point of this reminder is that even when you’re not in the…

I wanted to discuss my relationship with “my expiration date” and its social implications, particularly with healthy people my own age. As of 1997, when I was diagnosed with cystic fibrosis (CF), I was labeled a terminally ill patient. Sharing that information with acquaintances set the tone for our…

“This can’t be happening right now.” It was freezing outside, and once again I was in a daze, talking to my doctor while planning a trip. It was the second time, albeit for different reasons, that a trip I’d desperately been looking forward to was threatened by medical issues. The…

Shortly after my younger sister’s double-lung transplant, I’d watch my mom flip through family photo albums with my kids and think, how could she stand to do that? How could she stand looking at photos of what I’d begun thinking of as “the before time” — before cystic…

Grief doesn’t respect timing or social etiquette. It typically hits me at the worst times, when it’s inconvenient to have sweat trickling from my eyes. As I reflect on the complex changes that happened during my serious sick days before my double-lung transplant, and now five years later,…