My mastectomy was in May, and since then I’d been in a deep depression.  Instead of feeling better, I continued to feel worse – and December was the worst month yet.

My birthday was the second week of December, and my friends threw me a dinner party to celebrate. When they brought out the cake, I closed my eyes, leaned over the candles and made a wish. Actually, it was more like a prayer.  “Please, God, please don’t let this year be any worse than last year was. I can’t take any more.” 

 For months now I felt like someone very close to me had died, and no matter how honestly and deeply I grieved, the sadness wouldn’t lift.  No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t shake the darkness.  At the suggestion of my oncologist, I had joined an online breast cancer support group in the hopes of finding a community to encourage me while I recovered from the physical and emotional scars. I chatted with women who had walked this road, and I begged them to tell me what to do to get past this pain. 

One woman told me that she had been depressed after her mastectomy, too.  Her Kabbalah instructor told her to write an obituary to her breasts, and let them go.  After we’d chatted for a while, she wrote, “Honey, go write that obit and have a good cry.”

But in that moment, I wasn’t sad; I was mad. Write an obituary?  If I did that, the loss would be irrevocable. Say good-bye?  I had spent the past few months telling God how unacceptable this loss was, how He needed to appeal His decision and give me back my chest and my health and my life.  If I said good-bye, I would cement my loss, and God might think I was okay.

I was definitely not okay. I spent hours a day sitting on the couch in my studio apartment, staring at the sky while tears ran down my face. 

And so as I thought about my birthday wish, I told God He didn’t have to make my life better right away; I could probably survive as long as it didn’t get any worse.  I blew out the candle, but before I could open my eyes, people around the table started screaming and I smelled smoke. As I looked up to see what was happening, my boyfriend yelled, “Your hair’s on fire!”

He dumped water on his hand, then grabbed a fistful of my hair and squelched the flames.

As my nostrils filled with the stench of burnt hair and my friends scurried to clean up the mess, I wondered, “If your hair catches on fire while you’re making a wish, does that mean it isn’t coming true?”