On a personal note, I find it difficult to read books on breast cancer and memoirs of those touched by the disease, be it directly or by way of a loved one of the stricken. Having lost my maternal grandmother and nearly lost my mother to this illness, there seems to be an invisible cloud hovering over my head, a constant reminder that the odds of my being diagnosed are significantly higher than other women. There is the onus on me to be ever-vigilant — performing weekly (if not daily) checks — that becomes so consuming that I suddenly realize I might be in danger of not only driving myself to worry, but jeopardizing my spiritual health. Just this Christmas my mother had asked me to get a blood test to determine if it is typed for the gene that may cause cancer. Who wants to hear such talk over the holidays?
Such books by and for survivors, I realize, are not meant to discourage people like me who worry about inheriting something unwanted, though when handed a book on the subject, the cloud appears to darken. Reading Awake, O Sleeper: How I Rediscovered God Through Breast Cancer by 15-year-plus survivor Katherine Murphy, is refreshing to read in that, though I am fortunate never to have been afflicted, I find I can identify with the author through personal experiences shared with loved ones who have beaten the disease, and I can be assured that through the darkest moments in life one can find solace in the knowledge of God's love.
Katherine Murphy had a full life in 1988 with a loving husband and two children. Being in her late thirties, cancer was not a forethought, but something that happened to old people, and other people. This is not to say that Murphy never believed the young were immune to death (she recalls, in Sleeper, the death of a college roommate which appeared to have just as significant an impact upon her during her illness than when the event happened), but it was not something upon which to dwell, considering her family and her teaching job required the lion's share of her attention. One day in August changed that for Murphy upon learning that what she thought was a benign tumor was actually cancer — a cancer that is the second leading cause of death for women in the U.S., a cancer that accounts for one-third of all the cancers diagnosed in this country. (Source: American Cancer Society)
Awake, O Sleeper is taken from a verse in the Book of Ephesians, and becomes a mantra of sorts for the author as she deals with cancer surgery, recovery, and all the struggles involved: coping with vanity during hair loss and feeling unattractive, worrying over how her young sons will react to her illness, etc. Though Murphy had never considered herself a lapsed Catholic (she notes the family did attend church on a regular basis), it was not until her diagnosis that she realized she had been “asleep,” going through the motions of being Christian without truly appreciating God's gifts and the power of prayer. While her diagnosis served as the catalyst for a more earnest devotion to the Faith, the reader should note that a return to God need not be precipitated by tragic events. In Murphy's case, her renewed faith strengthened her resolve to fight her cancer.
As a memoir, Sleeper is a poignant story of survival, physical and spiritual, with moments of levity and heartache with which even those who have not been stricken ill can identify. As an inspirational, Sleeper is uplifting, a reminder to call upon God in the darkest moments of life.
(Kathryn Lively is the award-winning author of Catholic mystery novels Saints Preserve Us (Wings, 2003), Pray for Us Sinners (forthcoming from Wings, 2005) and Pithed (forthcoming from Mundania Press, 2004). She is also the author of a forthcoming children's book about Blessed Miguel Pro. Excerpts of her fiction are available here.)
