Felix Desmarais: In memory of Kathy, please get checked during Breast Cancer Awareness Month

Felix Desmarais with his dog Gracie around the time his family moved next to the Horsleys. Photo / Supplied

OPINION:

I bawled my eyes out as I rolled the towel, just as I'd been taught, and placed it in the rubbish bin.

It had once been a luxurious bath sheet - the fanciest towel I'd ever owned. It was given to me for my 21st birthday and went on to last for 13 years, surviving several flats in three different cities.

Raggedy and worn, it was time to let it go. But it felt like a betrayal to the woman who gave it to me, Kathy Horsley.

We moved from Mt Maunganui to Tauranga at the end of 1997, and, at nine years old, I was unimpressed. But the bonus of our new house was the neighbours - the Horsleys, with their two girls that I would become fast friends with.

For my mum, she found a new dear friend in their mum, Kathy, a practical yet overwhelmingly glamorous and sharp-witted woman whom I would grow to consider another parent.

They exchanged landline numbers, and Mum became familiar with a monosyllabic call from Kathy: "Bird!"

It was rather unfortunate Kathy was terrified of birds, since her house had a sweeping bay window that captured a bird a couple of times a year. Mum was enlisted as Head Bird Ouster, on-call around the clock.

Kathy was direct and often unequivocal in her positions. As well as refusing to deal with birds, she refused to parallel park. More than once, Mum found herself alone in the passenger seat of Kathy's car as she pulled to the side of the road and wordlessly exited the vehicle to allow Mum to take care of the tricky manoeuvre. She didn't want to do it, didn't want to learn, and that was that.

As dog lovers, we would walk - her, the girls, the dogs and I - in the cemeteries in our neighbourhood. One day, one of the girls ran over the top of one of the graves while chasing a dog, and I, ever the rule-keeper, said, "You can't do that, it's disrespectful."

Kathy said, "I think if I was down there I would love children and animals playing over the top of me." She believed the dead would appreciate and cherish the living.

I was always shocked by the way she would disagree in a firm but chipper way. It taught me disagreement doesn't have to mean disapproval.

Kathy, whose home was always kept beautiful and chic like herself (besides the dog hair on the couches), also taught me the best way to arrange a towel: fold it in half at the short end, again on the long end, and then roll from the short end. I still fold my towels - and tea towels - the same way today, and think of her every time. It's how I folded the towel she gave me, each time thinking of her and everything she taught me.

When Kathy found a lump in her breast in 2002, I was scared and worried for her. But as the years went on, she batted away cancer, and I came to think this powerful and forthright woman was utterly invincible. It was inconceivable cancer would have a patch on Kathy Horsley. She could simply stare it down, wordless, and it would slink away.

Felix Desmarais swimming in the Horsley's pool in 1998. Photo / Supplied

She outlived time limits set by doctors, but when it became apparent cancer was starting to win, I, now an adult living in Wellington, told Mum to tell Kathy that I loved her. I'd never told her that before because I didn't think I'd had to. I also didn't want to tell her myself precisely because I had never told her, and telling her now might feel like an admission she was dying. It was cowardly. I wish I'd told her myself.

Mum said Kathy said, simply, she loved me too.

Kathy died in 2010, just before Christmas.

It was particularly cruel since she loved Christmas. Only 55, she missed out on seeing her eldest daughter marry. It is so unbelievably unfair.

Breast cancer killed 641 New Zealanders in 2010. That's 640 other batches of friends and family affected the way we were losing Kathy, an indomitable force who endures in our memories. I talked to one of her daughters before writing this, and she said she thought Kathy would be proud if this would help other people get checked.

October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month. This week on Thursday, Kathy would have turned 67 and prepared to soon see her youngest daughter - the spitting image of her - get married.

So, in her memory, please get checked, and live life running and playing, because it is short and precious.

HOW TO SELF-CHECK

TLC: Touch, Look, Check.

There's no 'right' way to check your breasts. It's just important to know your normal and to check regularly for any unusual changes.

Things to look for include: a new lump or thickening, an inverted nipple, nipple discharge, a crusty nipple, dimples, puckering or dents, reddened, orange-peel-like skin, unusual breast pain or a change in the shape of your breasts.

MAMMOGRAMS

BreastScreen Aotearoa provide free mammograms every two years for women with no symptoms aged between 45 and 69 (this upper limit will be progressively increased to 74). These are provided at BSA's contracted fixed sites and also at mobile screening units.

Book a mammogram here.

BREAST CANCER AWARENESS MONTH - HOW YOU CAN HELP

Pink Ribbon Street Appeal – Grab a bucket, get dressed up in pink and join thousands of volunteers collecting around NZ on October 28 and 29.

Pink for a Day - Join hundreds of workplaces that go Pink For a Day during Breast Cancer Awareness Month and start conversations about breast health and wellbeing.

Pink Ribbon Walk – Walk 5km or 10km for the ones you love in Christchurch (October 30), Auckland (November 6) or Wellington (November 13).

Shop for good – Buy a Pink Product from sponsors including Estée Lauder, Bobbi Brown, ghd, Sealy, and Griffin's, and a portion of sales will go towards Breast Cancer Foundation NZ's life-saving work.

For more information go to breastcancerfoundation.org.nz.

SOURCE: NZ Breast Cancer Foundation