The Most Beautiful Sound Monologue

Photo Credit John Cornicello

My creative writing coach Jeff Leisawitz contacted me back in March to ask if I’d like to write and record a 2-3 minute monologue about my cancer journey for an inspirational ad campaign he was helping produce.

Below you will find the monologue I wrote and recorded for The Most Beautiful Sound, a breakthrough technology that captures the sound of cancer cells dying. You can listen to my story and 5 others living with cancer by visiting www.themostbeautifulsound.org. I am deeply honored to be a part of this scientific breakthrough and the hope it will give cancer patients everywhere.

I was reading bedtime stories to my 5 year old daughter when I first felt the lump.

It was tender, located just behind my left nipple, and immediately I sensed something was wrong. That night before taking a shower I recorded my thoughts “I think I have cancer.”

It was February 2022 and I was on the brink of publishing a memoir I’d been writing for 6 years. Early the next month, after submitting the final manuscript to my editor, I had my first ever mammogram. By the end of that week, the diagnosis was confirmed—I had breast cancer.

What happened next was a whirlwind of consultations, diagnostic tests, blood work, and beginning to accept that my life would never be the same—again. This cancer diagnosis was not my first rodeo with trauma. I’d suffered the loss of my stillborn daughter, Poppy, in 2015 and she’d inspired me to write my book, Still Breathing.

Just as I was celebrating my new identity as a published author, life handed me another epic challenge and reluctantly, I stepped onto the hero’s path once again.

 Within a month of that first mammogram, I began receiving aggressive chemotherapy for my stage IV diagnosis, the cancer had moved from my breast and lymph nodes and had metastasized into my sternum.

 Chemotherapy was exhausting and at times debilitating, but I made it through by leaning on my community, asking for and receiving help, writing candidly on social media, and getting curious about the possibility of life after death.

 I wept, grieved, and felt rage. Balls dropped; goals were pushed to the back burner. Weakened by the very medicines designed to save my life, I focused on making it through each day. I slept and slept and slept.

 I paid attention to my dreams and began receiving messages and insights from realms beyond this one. I released my fear of death and embraced the temporal and sweet life I have on earth.

 After 5 months of chemo, I had an MRI that came back normal! I rejoiced believing that every cancer cell was gone. I’d won the war.

 Then I fought another internal battle—accepting that treatment wasn’t over yet. For the best chance of long-term survival, I still needed a mastectomy and lymph node surgeries as well as 28 rounds of radiation.

 I am happy to report that I’ve survived both. As I continue to heal and gain energy, each day has become a practice in self-love and grace.

 Nothing has been easy about this journey, but I’ve received it as another opportunity evolve as a spiritual being having a physical experience. Cancer invited me to slow down, and in that space, I found ways to embrace the mystical nature of this life and the gift of each passing day.