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Hi, My name is Lisa, and I live in East Hampton, New York. (affectionately known as “The Hampton’s”) I live by myself with my 2 dogs Jack Straw, and Cassidy. I am joining Amazon Heart in September to support the girls riding Harley’s to San Francisco. I will be the van driver! I was one of those people that thought cancer was for other people, Not me. Cancer did not apply to me. I was too healthy, and too young. My doctor thought so also. In fact I was coming from the gym, after a great work out. It was July 2007. I was feeling pretty good. I just started a new beachwear company called Asparagus Beach, I had several different part time jobs, along with my real estate career keeping me busy, and I was really feeling that my life was finally beginning to flow. That’s when the phone call came from a doctor who happened to be filling in for my regular doctor. He was as shocked as me, as he had never given bad news like this before. He walked in Monday morning to a positive result of cancer sitting on his desk. The test results belonged to me, invasive breast cancer. “ Was I going to die”? I never thought that before in my life. It was the beginning of life no longer in denial of death being just around the corner. The rage, the anger, the sadness, the Shock. Why me? I sat in my car hysterical crying to my mother that I had breast cancer and I needed to come to his office first thing in the morning. But I wouldn’t know how bad it was until I had a mastectomy and they removed all my lymph nodes from under my right arm. Then they can stage it by seeing how many lymph nodes the cancer spread to, and how large the tumor was….I was diagnosed stage 3a breast cancer. This must be a joke…right? Because this could not really be happening. I finished my chemo in January, and Elizabeth from my office convinced me to go the YSC. Young Survivor Coalition. It was the best thing I could have done for myself.(thank you Liz) All these women under 45 years age, have all walked the walk…and we were one big family. As much as my parents and friends have given me their support, they cant even imagine the power of "those in the know” supporting one another. It is a club that I belong to, and can become completely liberated, because we are all “in the know” together. My support groups, blogs, conferences, healing circles have empowered me. They transformed me. They give me the strength of a woman, and the truth behind the exterior. I relate different to people now, I have made so many friends that I never would have made. I want to scream out to the world, how lucky I am to have been given this gift of truth and awareness, and I want to support and help women that think they cannot get through this horrible trauma. I have; and my life has only been evolving more rapidly, and "spinning like a big bright blue ball spinning free."(John Barlow) I want to continue my mission to raise awareness to the world that breast cancer needs a cure. I want to empower young women that are in the middle of this terror. Amazon Heart is a support system for young women all over the world. I can't wait to be a part of this amazing motorcycle ride so we can continue to spread the positive energy to anyone at all that has been affected. Less than 10% of breast cancer cases are genetically inherited.1 Most women diagnosed with breast cancer do not have a family history of the disease. .
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