Cancer Conversations

Liv was scared. It was her first shift back after her mastectomy and reconstruction and she didn’t know whether she could do it or not. She was beginning to think that perhaps she didn’t have the courage she needed. Whose body was this anyhow?

A few words of explanation: “Back” is back to the stage. “It” is dancing, stripping actually. Liv, aka “Viva Las Vegas,” is a stripper. She’s danced, and stripped, at a club for 18 years. It’s a job she loves. The connection with people is what draws her, she tells me. With a degree in Cultural Anthropology from a prestigious college, she is fascinated by people and the lives they live. Men who come to the club tell her their stories and she loves to hear them. “I’m a good listener,” she says, “perhaps a bit like a social worker.” Plus, the pay is good, the hours are good, and she enjoys moving to music she selects. Yet, it definitely takes a level of bodily comfort few jobs require.

Looking out into the audience that night, Liv saw a fellow who had not been there before, and somehow she was drawn to him. After her set she learned his story. A trucking accident caused the amputation of both his legs. That, however, was not his story. Following the accident, he became an expert scuba diver who helps recover drug money from sunken ships. He also guides tourists on dives in Central America. “Our bodies can do amazing things,” he told her. “But we’re not our bodies. They’re here for us to use in the best way we can.” His words struck her. What he had overcome was tremendous. Could she accept her new body as he did his?

Waking Up

More than a year earlier, a small lump in one of her breasts had alerted Liv to the possibility something might be amiss. Believing it was nothing she took it as a wakeup call and vowed to change her diet and meditate more. An ultrasound, however, categorized it as stage zero breast cancer – worthy of a double mastectomy.

Stage zero? Double mastectomy? Seemed a bit drastic. The prevailing protocol of looking at age, she was under 35, the strong potential it was hormonally driven, and the fact her breasts were small pointed to the surgery. After consulting several oncologists, she opted for a single mastectomy because of her desire to have children and to be able to nurse from the unaffected breast.

Erring on the side of caution, and trusting in her oncologist’s recommendation and his good words, “You’re young and healthy, you’ll be fine,” she opted for chemotherapy following the surgery.

That optimism and the support of a large circle of friends pulled her through. Being away from dancing was a challenge. She worked at other jobs but kept considering the possibility of going back to what she really enjoyed. But did she want to return to the stage? Could she? As her body returned to normal, or the new version of it, she decided that yes, perhaps she could dance again.

Fake vs real

And yet. How presentable were her breasts? It’s not like she would be keeping them under wraps. Would the difference between the real breast and the “fake” one be obvious? She credits and praises her reconstruction surgeon for the nearly identical appearance of her breasts.  “I still have my nipple on the new one, so they look very much the same,” she says. “But the muscles underneath make them move differently, and to me they feel differently.”

That, however, is merely the physical side. The connection with people, the opportunity to observe and engage is what Liv likes about being a stripper. “Men really are so accepting,” she says. “They’re not necessarily there for the nudity. They’re there for the connection.”

Physical appearance, Liv believes strongly, is much less important than most people think. This is from a woman who spent much of her youth as a tomboy, was so embarrassed by her changing body that she refused to strip down even to a bathing suit until she was nearly 20, and spent years with anorexia.

Those issues, and the concerns of a body altered by cancer, are now history. Liv continues to dance. Occasionally, someone will notice and comment, like the man who asked, ever so quietly, if she’d had cancer. His wife had had cancer and he’d recognized the scar. He sympathized with her and said she looked beautiful and hoped she was doing well.

And there was the fellow dancer who found out she’d had cancer, said she thought her breasts looked perfect, and asked if they were real. “That,” Liv replied, “depends on your definition of reality.”

Final Note

More than a year later now, Liv and her beautiful baby daughter are doing very well.