Shawn Henry, a Memphis resident who lives just south of Bartlett, was enjoying a rite of passage for her daughter in July 2009, taking a trip with her to visit colleges. The 43-year-old woke up that morning and accidentally found a lump when her hand brushed across the top of one breast.
“I knew right away what it was,” she said. “I had a dear friend who had cancer — breast cancer — who had passed away a couple of years earlier.”
She had gone to all of that friend’s treatments and was already well versed in breast cancer signs and treatments. Her gut instincts told her this was bad.
Two days later, she called her doctor, who set up an immediate mammogram and then a biopsy to confirm the diagnosis: Cancer.
She had one thing positive going for her, though: “Early detection is the key. Early detection.”
She advises other cancer patients to use their own strength to make it through. “Go into this with a fighting attitude. You can do this. It’s okay to have bad days. You are doing the best that you can every day. And keep looking toward the future. You will get through the chemos, the radiation, the doctor’s appointments. There is life on the other side. And just keep fighting. You just keep fighting.”
During her own treatment, she learned to be more assertive, asking the important questions about the disease and her treatment options.
“You have to be able to ask the questions,” she said. “A lot of people feel that they are not able to talk to a doctor or question what the doctor’s telling you. It is okay to have a conversation with the doctor and ask the questions. Listen to what they say. Disagree with them or agree is okay. I have learned that whatever type of treatment you choose, it is correct. You don’t have to have people agree with you. At the end of the day, you have to live with your choices. … You choose and you are correct. So don’t doubt yourself.”
Be your own advocate, she advised. If you can’t, bring someone to appointments to ask the questions that you’re too shy, intimidated, afraid or uninformed to ask.
Henry learned that she was in Stage 2B of breast cancer. She opted for a lumpectomy that left her with about a six-inch scar on the side of one breast. Then three weeks later she started six rounds of chemotherapy, spaced three weeks apart. She felt fine with Cytoxan, but when she started the Taxotere, nausea and jittery nerves set in. The treatments left her exhausted but she usually recovered over a long weekend in bed.
Her oncologist, Dr. Kurt Tauer, warned her to get a short haircut and be prepared to shave her head after the first three weeks when the chemo drugs affected her hair follicles. Most patients find it traumatizing to see clumps of hair on their pillow or in the shower drain, he said. Taking control helps.
So Henry was picking her son up from school when she noticed some of her hair had fallen. She told a nearby friend, Sharon Fryman, she was going to get her head shaved. But the friend had a better idea. Fryman and her sister, Linda Barnes came over that night with margaritas and clippers. Fryman had the fallen locks swept up and discarded before Henry could even look down.
“So I did not see the loss of my hair. You saw it on your head, but not the hair itself laying on the ground. So they came, they shaved my head, we had margaritas, talked and laughed. They helped me cope. By the next day, I was totally bald.”
At the same time, Henry also went into menopause with severe hot flashes. Her doctor reassured her that symptom was separate from the chemo and said she may never have another period. And she didn’t.
“That was the only gift I got from cancer,” she said, laughing softly.
She endured it all with help from a competent doctor with strong communication skills. She talked frankly and clearly about how her body felt, and he explained how the cancer treatments were affecting her and what the different medicines would do. She also took his advice not to scare or misinform herself with online cancer research.
Friends also made a big difference for Henry. She had a chemo friend, Cathy Winter, who took her to her doctors’ visits and her chemo sessions. “She was wonderful to have,” Henry said. “… So I was blessed.”
About four weeks after her last chemo session, Henry began her radiation therapy. She tolerated the 36 treatments well and didn’t suffer burns as severe as some patients do, but getting the shingles along her spine two days later was miserable. She chalked that up to her body being fed up with the whole process.
She is originally from the New Orleans area and has no nearby family members. She also had a mom’s responsibilities for her three children: A sixth-grader who was 11, a high school senior who was 17 and an adult child who was about 21.
She has worked as a Pre-Kindergarten 4 teacher’s aide for almost 20 years at Immanuel Lutheran School in Memphis and also worships at the associated church. People at both institutions took loving care of her.
“The church and the school got us through it. They truly had pitched in — the food, the prayers, the cutting of our grass — I mean, they went beyond helping us.”
Former students and their parents told Henry they were praying for her, and they dropped off food at her house.
Her first chemo was about four days after the school year started, so she prepared her class by telling them simply that a very special medicine would make her hair fall out and it would be okay. The little children were fascinated when they saw her with a scarf on her head one day, and they asked to see and then touch her smooth scalp.
“So I had little hands touching my head,” she said, “They just wanted to feel that it was okay. And I told them, ‘This is not going to happen to you. It’s my special medicine.’”
About six months later, her hair began to regrow. When she eventually came to class without a scarf, one of her little boy students turned to her and said, “Mrs. Shawn, your hair is beautiful.”
She smiled. “I had stubble. I didn’t have hair – I just had stubble on my head, and he thought my hair was beautiful. Out of the mouths of children is the kindest things.”
In the 10 years since her own cancer diagnosis, she’s had about a dozen friends who were diagnosed as well. About five of those had breast cancer, and the others had different types. She’s done her best to be there for them.
“They just want to hear the hope in your voice – that, yes, it’s horrible to go through, but you will come out on that other side,” Henry said. “That you are there for them if they need you for anything, to talk about what happened to you. Little things that help you get through chemo. Little things that help you get through radiation. Or sometimes just to be the person they can talk to when they are frustrated and when they’re hurt and when they’re not understanding a diagnosis, where they’re angry. Because you get angry at a point. And sometimes not telling it to your spouse, because they understand, but they don’t. So I think everyone needs a friend who they can vent to – who will just sit there and let them vent and say, ‘I understand that.’ Because all that person wants is to be heard and to know that they’re angry, to know that they’re scared, that they don’t feel good.”
People need someone to vent to and someone who will, on other days, be their cheerleader, she said.
Reflecting on her own fight against cancer, Henry said that one of the first questions she asked her doctor was how much time had to pass before she would be considered cancer-free: Five years? Ten?
“He said, ‘I’ve had a patient come back after 19 years.’ And I looked at him and I said, ‘Okay.’”
Without that reassurance, she keeps her spirits up with daily prayers that she is done with cancer. She watches diligently for signs of returning cancer and communicates any questions or concerns to her doctor. And she continues to thrive.
Her husband tells Henry that surviving cancer has steadied her. She agreed: The frustrations and small crises of normal everyday life don’t stir her emotions anymore. And the happy moments matter so much more.
“I feel like I see more clearly small little miracles,” she said. “… The little things you take greater pleasure in. More smiling, more hugs, more enjoying the loving moments. And a lot of things we are quick to judge on aren’t important to judge. It doesn’t make a difference. In the scheme of things, on your last day, will that major problem you thought you had mean anything?”
CAROLYN BAHM is the editor of The Bartlett Express. Contact her at (901) 433-9138 or via email to carolyn@magicvalleypublishing.com.
