In Lieu of a Prologue

It hurt. It burned. I was twenty-five and in a hurry. Applying makeup as I got ready to go out with friends, I poked my eye with the eyeliner pencil. Ouch. The sting.

Initially red, the spot bruised, got darker with time. Then the pain went away, but a scar remained for the next two decades: a dark brown dot next to the iris in my right eye. In my portrait—a college graduation souvenir—in the mirror every morning, that spot glared at me with expectation, demanding my attention. But nobody else noticed, not my parents, not my older brother, or my younger sister. If they did, they said nothing. I decided not to give the intruder another thought. 

---

"C'mon, you must've known you're one in a million," Dr. Feurst says. 

Wait. Did I? What does that mean? 

"It's cancer, a rare form of melanoma. One in a million people have this," he says.

Stunned. I glance at my seventeen-year-old daughter. Did she hear that? The blunt, casual declaration of the "c" word in connection with her mother? I came in for a regular eye exam like the ones I've had annually at this same office with the same doctors for years. 

Speechless. I wait for the doctor's recommendation.

"You must see a specialist, Dr. Irvine at USC Eye Institute, the best in the field. Call him right away." 

I do.

Dr. Irvine's out of town. I won't be able to see him for a week. While I wait, I don't dare share the news with anyone other than my husband and son. I don't tell my parents, my brother, or my sister. Who cares about my catastrophe anyway? I'm middleborn. Never the center of attention. I learned to follow the rules, be self-sufficient, and stay out of sight. 

"She's so quiet; I can never tell if she's home or not." My mother joked whenever visitors asked about me. Over the years, I became convinced that no one in my family would notice if I dropped dead.

---

A nanosecond. A single poke. A misguided stab in the wrong place. The incident I deemed inconsequential twenty-three years ago has resurfaced, threatening my life. What can I do?

My kids give me hugs. I say little. My husband, Charlie, lets me cry on his chest night after night. After 20 years, he can look closely into my eyes and notice turbulence, sunshine, and stars in the dark. The spot has never been a topic of conversation between us. Nor have I needed to explain until now. I want to reason, analyze, and understand. But I know for sure—I don't want to become my family's bad luck, my husband's burden. I stop crying.

"Yep, this doesn't happen often," Dr. Irvine confirms a week later, and asks for permission to share his findings with a group of medical researchers at a National Conference in Florida.

I spend the following week clicking on gruesome pictures that pop up on my computer screen. The possibility of death scares me. I'll miss my children, my nineteen-year-old son who's given me too much grief lately, my daughter who doesn't leave my side, and sings Les Misérables from the first to the last note.

I may end up with a hole in place of an eye? I may have to wear a prosthetic eye. Will people notice an artificial eye? Will my parents, brother, and sister see the change if I don't tell them? I don't want that. Or do I? 

Among all the disturbing information, I find sites offering alternative cures for cancer. These are not as straightforward as Mayo Clinic and WebMD. Still, I read.  Try to comprehend somatic symptoms of unresolved emotional and psychological issues. Resentment causes cancer, they say. The right side of the body aligns with one's active or male energy patterns; the left with the passive or female. The energies of the right connect to one's father, while those of the left connect to the mother. I tuck all that somewhere in my brain and put my faith in Dr. Irvine's hands.

In the spring of 2010, Dr. Irvine performs the magic of modern medicine. He removes the cancerous lesion, treats the wound with cryotherapy. 

Diagnosis: cancer in situ - metastasis not expected. 

Two years later, concerned about my frequent headaches and vertigo, the neurologist suggested I have an MRI. 

On May 27, 2012, at 7:00 AM, before I start my day of teaching third graders in my hometown of Pasadena, California, I visit the radiology center. By lunchtime, the neurologist has left a message on my cell phone to call her regarding the imaging results. The word ‘urgent’ in her message sends shockwaves down my spine. My heart pounding, I call her office.

"Should I be concerned?" I ask the head nurse, close my eyes, and press the phone to my ear. 

"Well, that is why we need you to come in right away," she says. "How soon can you get here?"

As soon as the dismissal bell rings, I take off. Charlie meets me there. Expecting nothing positive, we both draw inward, holding our breath in the clasp of our hands. I'm afraid that if he lets go, I'll stop breathing.

The neurologist pulls up the image of my brain on the screen. She points to the bright spot the size of a dime in the middle. 

"I don't know what that is, but that shouldn't be there," she says.

We sit in silence. Neither of us knows what to say. Then, in the elevator, Charlie hugs me.

"You're going to be okay, darling. You will." 

I want to believe him, but the image of the spot in my middle brain doesn't leave my sight. I've been a healthy, active person throughout my youth, didn't expect a life-threatening health issue. Still, for some reason, unusual conditions arise in my middle years, one after another. Blindsided, cheated, betrayed by my own body. Where did I go wrong? 

I get another phone call in the afternoon.

"I suggest we do one more thing," the doctor says. "A CT scan will identify the type of tissue, something an MRI doesn't do. I cannot be sure, but I'm hopeful." 

"Lipoma, a fatty tissue, most likely impacted in the folds of your brain during fetal formation, not likely the cause of headaches or vertigo," Dr. Caton, the brain surgeon, says.

This tall, thin man with soft gray hair, khaki pants, and brown leather loafers looks like an angel. His calm demeanor lifts the heavy veil that is wrapped around me. 

My husband and I breathe a sigh of relief. I know, I have to find out why I keep stumbling upon myself. Resentment? I'd better take a closer look. I start digging into my childhood in the Soviet Republic of Armenia in the 70s.