Top Ten Good Things About Crappy Genes

Upon discovering that my sister also carries the BRCA gene causing her now to have to undergo the same surgeries as I, I felt the need to come up with a "cheer up" top ten list for our situation. And here it is:

Tina,

I'm sorry! This gene sucks. It is forcing you to make decisions you should not have to make and it sucks!

But let's look at the good things about this:

1. We will have no place for breast and ovarian cancer to grow which puts us in a pretty good spot!

2. We will be watched like hawks by our doctors and screened regularly, so if we ever do get cancer somewhere else, it will be caught early, and it will be survivable.

3. When we have our surgery, our husbands will not be able to complain about anything and must wait on us hand and foot!

4. We get to have those tattoos we always wanted . . . right on our nipples! Ok, that's not a good one.

5. We are going to have some nice boobs! No sagging! No bras! Our friends will be soooooooo jealous!

6. We get to tell people our story and encourage people with histories like ours to get tested and maybe even spare someone the heartache of cancer!

7. We finally can confirm that I was NOT left by gypsies like you always told me when we were little.

8. We can pose naked in Playboy for an informative article on gene testing!

9. No more periods!

10. We will always have someone else who knows how we feel. We are in this together, and it is going to be ok. We are both cancer-free and we are going to stay that way!!

I love you!