SHE WALKS TO PAY IT FORWARD
She’s completed 21 three-day, 60-mile events to raise funds
Shirley Ernst considers herself lucky. When she underwent treatment for early stage breast cancer 23 years ago, she had good medical insurance and a supportive husband.
So, she walks to raise funds for those with breast cancer who don’t have health insurance or coverage for mammograms. She walks for Susan G. Komen and pays the $2,300 entry fee to participate in three-day, 60-mile Komen walks all over the country. In the past decade, she has completed 21 60-mile walks from Seattle to Boston.
A retired children’s literature professor at Eastern Connecticut State University, Ernst, 77, isn’t independently wealthy. The Willington resident crochets stuffed animals and dolls called amigurumi to raise funds for her walks. Ernst covers the cost of yarn and shipping, so when someone makes a donation of $30, $60 or $100, they can request the stuffed animal, fairy or doll of their choice from her website, Crochet4thecure.com, and the full donation helps those with breast cancer.
“It really feels good. I feel like I’m paying it forward,” says Ernst, who was 54 when diagnosed with Stage 1 breast cancer.
Like so many women, Ernst found the lump herself. When she went to her annual checkup with her gynecologist, she didn’t tell him about the lump and he didn’t find it in her breast exam. She didn’t want to “make a mountain out of a molehill, otherwise known as being in denial,” she says.
Her mammogram didn’t detect anything either. Ultrasounds for women with dense breasts were not routine as they are for Connecticut women today.
“Once I found the lump, part of me knew it wasn’t going to be good. A friend had ovarian cancer. I was more concerned about her,” she says. The lump “was like a rock in the middle of the road and you kick it aside.”
Finally, after living with the lump for a year, she insisted her gynecologist re-check the area. He didn’t think it was anything but sent her to a general surgeon to be sure. The surgeon ordered an ultrasound but nothing showed up. The surgeon suggested a lumpectomy to remove the tumor and put her mind at ease, and that’s when she learned it was cancer. The first surgery didn’t get clean margins, so she had a second lumpectomy that involved removing dozens of lymph nodes.
She had read that people who have lymph nodes removed are at risk for lymphedema, which causes swelling in the arm, so she underwent physical therapy right after surgery to prevent it. Despite being advised to wear a compression sleeve to minimize swelling while flying, she doesn’t wear it because it interferes with her crocheting.
Ernst says she’s more confident and assertive now than she was then and advises women of all ages who feel any kind of lump to get it checked.
“I think women need to be responsible for themselves,” she says. “I take more charge of my life now. If I have a question for the doctor, I will ask. I don’t want to take things for granted. I want to be in control of my own life. … I think [cancer] helped me to become more self-confident.”
Her illness has made her more aware of others’ cancer. She’s happy to help them through it and share how she stays positive, she says. Her experience strengthened her belief that everyone needs to be responsible for themselves and their health.
She has more fully embraced what she loves — growing flowers, dancing and walking.
“I’ve made some wonderful friends on the walk,” she says. She dresses in bright pink for the walk, wears her hair in pigtails and got her husband, Bob, to wear a pink angel costume, which he accessorizes with a glittery cap.
“If I’m not hurting somebody,” Ernst says, “I’m going to do what I want to do.”
Her first thought was “Let me have it again, not my mother.”