Transcription of Art & The American Cancer Society, #94
Male: You’re listening to the Dr. Lisa radio hour and podcast recorded at the studios of Maine Magazine at 75 Market Street, Portland, Maine. Download past shows and become a podcast subscriber with Dr. Lisa Belisle on iTunes. See the Dr. Lisa website or Facebook page for details.
Male: The Dr. Lisa radio hour and podcast is made possible with the support of the following generous sponsors. Maine Magazine, Marci Booth of boothmaine, Apothecary by Design, Premier Sports Health a division of Black Bear Medical, Dr. John Herzog of Orthopedic Specialists, Mike LePage and Beth Franklin of ReMax Heritage, Ted Carter Inspired Landscapes and Tom Shepard of Shepard Financial.
Lisa: This is Dr. Lisa Belisle and you’re listening to the Dr. Lisa radio hour and podcast show number 94, Art and the American Cancer Society, airing for the first time on Sunday June 30th, 2013. Today’s guests include Sue Clifford and Cheryl Tucker from the American Cancer Society of Maine, Sally Loughridge, author, artist and cancer survivor and Caroline Knight, Pen Bay Cancer Researcher.
Growth is usually considered a good thing. Babies grow, flowers grow, even mutual funds grow. From these types of growth we obviously derive benefits. Cancer also represents growth, a growth of abnormal cells. Abnormal cancer cells compete with normal cells for the body’s resources. The only way to manage cancer is to kill the abnormal cells often along with normal cells such as those found in the skin, hair and intestinal tract. In the case of cancer growth yields destruction but it can also lead to positive growth in other ways.
Cancer patients may find themselves stronger and more resilient than they ever thought possible. They may finally tap into creative potential that had remained dormant until becoming necessary for their healing. They may also find themselves the center of a community that has grown in response to their needs. Destructive cancerous growth can thus in a strange way be of benefit. Not always of course.
Cancer does cause death, sometimes a death that comes too early in a person’s life. There’s nothing redemptive about that but if we always seek to know how we grow positively in the face of destruction we will almost invariably find some way in which this might be so. Thank you for joining us today. We hope you enjoy our interviews with Sue Clifford and Cheryl Tucker from the American Cancer Society of Maine, Sally Loughridge, author, artist and cancer survivor and Caroline Knight, Pen Bay Cancer Researcher.
Lisa: Cancer is a diagnosis that impacts all of us and because this is so we’re fortunate to have people like Sue Clifford and Cheryl Tucker from the Maine Chapter of the American Cancer Society to help us on our journey. Sue and Cheryl thanks for coming in and talking to us today about the work that the Maine Chapter of the American Cancer Society is doing.
Cheryl: Thank you for having us.
Sue: Thank you.
Lisa: Like most people who are listening I’ve had cancer in my family, in my grandmother, my grandfather and it’s something that it’s become so commonplace that sometimes we forget the detection. Still a very serious thing but doesn’t always get cured. It requires support. This is what it sounds like the Maine Chapter of the American Cancer Society is out there trying to do.
Cheryl: Cancer is a chronic illness we have over 9,100 people we expect to be diagnosed in Maine this year. That’s a pretty high number but we do have about 75,000 Mainers that are living with a history of cancer so to a point yeah there are a lot people that do need support and look for support from the American Cancer Society for their journey.
Sue: We’re really trying to approach it on a couple of different levels. One is by getting a lot of messages out about prevention and early detection and the importance of catching your cancer early so that you can be a survivor and not a statistic. Then we also have our programs and services to help people who are currently battling the disease to make their life more comfortable. They don’t have to worry about where somebody might be that could give them a ride to their appointment because their families have to work.
They can’t take time off from work. A lot of times the medication cancer patients are taking it says on the bottle do not drive while taking this medication. How are you supposed to get to your treatment appointments without things like support from the American Cancer Society?
Lisa: It seems to me as though there has been an increase and I think that this is true from my medical training I could say, an increase in cancer cases over the last 100 years. Is this true with the state of Maine as well as nationally and internationally?
Sue: Yeah absolutely part of it is because cancer tends to be a disease that strikes people later in life. It doesn’t always of course but the statistics prove that as you age there are more things that you, your heart disease risks increase, your cancer risk increases, your diabetes risk increases. Maine unfortunately has an aging population. It’s considered one of the oldest states in the United States so that’s one reason why instead of heart disease being the number one cause of death in Maine it is cancer instead.
Lisa: That’s unusual?
Sue: It is unusual.
Lisa: What are some of the top cancers that Maine people fall victim too?
Cheryl: Lung cancer is the number one cancer in Maine. However then for women breast cancer and for men prostate cancer and then of course colon cancer is the third and then melanoma.
Sue: Those are the top cancers really that people should be most concerned about getting screened for. Women should get annual mammograms. Men should talk to their doctors about what tests might be right for them for prostate cancer. Certainly melanoma is one where you should always check your body when you take a shower and look for any changes in your skin. Of course lung cancer it can be avoided if you watch your smoking and tobacco products and other things from …
Cheryl: Actually it’s interesting in Maine we actually have a high rate of melanoma and that’s surprising. You would think in a state ours where we don’t get outside as much but thinking about some of our industries fishermen and who are in the coast, outdoor recreation activities that we do have a rather high rate so it’s something we really need to think about.
Sue: Skiing in winter, you should always wear sunscreen even in the winter.
Lisa: Perhaps it’s because we live in a state like Maine where don’t have as much consistent sunlight that we aren’t as good about putting sunscreen on. When we get out there we really want to enjoy that sun so we’re aren’t quite as good about protecting ourselves.
Sue: Absolutely and a lot of the jobs in Maine are based outdoors. We’re an active state. We have a lot of outdoor things that people enjoy doing.
Lisa: Has there been any relationship noted between some of the industries and certain types of cancers in the state? Some of the mills, paper mills some of the harm environmentally?
Sue: That’s something that we currently have a lot of research going on about. The American Cancer Society is one of the largest funders of cancer researches and non‑governmental funder research. They do look at a lot of different things. They look at naturally occurring radon in a state like Maine where we live on granite ledge and then they also look at the industrial products that are long-term state over the years. That’s long-term research studies and I don’t think we’re able to do any conclusive evidence about that yet but certainly something that people should be aware of to always try to eliminate your exposure to any types of chemicals even household products. I would also just add that if someone has a particular concern about say radon or asbestos we have a lot of great information on our website where someone can actually go to cancer.org and go the search bar and put that in and see what does the American Cancer Society have to say about that particular thing.
Lisa: One of the things that people have expressed to me over time is that with all of the information that’s out there it’s hard to know which information is well researched. What sources it comes from? Is this one way in which the American Cancer Society can be helpful to people?
Sue: Absolutely, not only because we have been rated by other people that are not associated with us. If you can be assured that it’s … We’re top rated for all of our information for the cancer research that we do. Forty six of our 100 researchers how gone on to win Nobel prizes for their work. We don’t necessarily rate other cancer organizations but we can take what they are using for messages and ours is science and evidence based and if theirs is not then it would be something that we would probably not recommend for someone.
Cheryl: Just adding to that basically if you call our 800 number or look at our website and have a question related to cancer in any way it won’t be on our website or available for information unless it’s been tried in truth, studied and researched. We are very much a data driven organization.
Lisa: Science and evidence based. What are the some of the similarities and differences between the American Cancer Society and some of the more cancer‑specific organizations say organizations that are working with breast cancer or prostate cancer? How do you …
Sue: I don’t think there are a lot of differences. We’re all working towards the same goal of eliminating cancer or at least reducing its harsh effects on people’s quality of life. We do all partner and work together a lot of times.
Lisa: One of the cancers that I’m reading about here, you gave me this when you came in. You gave me the cancer facts and figures for 2013 with a special section on pancreatic cancer. Why is this something that the American Cancer Society decided to focus on?
Sue: We really had seen an increase in number of diagnoses for pancreatic cancer in the last few years and so it has risen to the top. It’s something that people are becoming more and more concerned about.
Cheryl: Well and pancreatic cancer is a cancer that when diagnosed often times it’s a diagnoses late into the cancer because it’s hard to screen for that. There’s a lot … Unfortunately many people don’t survive beyond five years with this diagnosis so obviously there’s a lot we can still learn.
Sue: Yes both of us have been touched by people in our families who have died of pancreatic cancer so we understand why the heightened interest in it because we’re very interested in it ourselves.
Lisa: I’ve treated patients with pancreatic cancer and it is striking how, yes how late it’s diagnosed and how quickly it progresses and how painful and debilitating, I think most cancers have some pain and debilitation associated with them but pancreatic cancer is really one of the bigger challenges I think when it comes to cancer these days.
Sue: Absolutely and really some of the success cases have been people who have been diagnosed with some problem with another internal organ and the doctors can find the pancreatic cancer at a very early stage while they’re in that body cavity. There’s no way that you can x-ray that deep into the body looking for tumors and that sort of thing. It’s really trying to determine if they can come up with a blood test that might have an enzyme in it that might point to some sort of thing. Those are the types of research that we’re looking at now for this type of disease.
Cheryl: I think just speaking to as Sue alluded to earlier on we both have a personal experience with pancreatic cancer in our families, I am very happy to see that cancer facts and figures is focusing on that because we often do hear about the top five cancers. It’s nice to see what’s going on in other cancers.
Lisa: The American Cancer Society as you said funds research really nationally and probably internationally and one of those research sites is right here on Maine.
Sue: Yes we actually have a funded researcher at the Jackson Laboratory in Bar Harbor. She had a $720,000 grant over four years that was to study stem cells in the treatment of brain tumors.
Lisa: Very fascinating in emerging science. So you have research. It sounds like you do outreach and you’ve alluded to some of the support that you offer cancer patients and their families. Tell me a little bit about that.
Cheryl: The first that I would like to talk about when asked that question is our transportation program. We know certainly in a state like Maine we have a large geography. We have a lot of world communities and we have worked with a lot of wonderful volunteers throughout the state that offer transportation for cancer patients going to their medical treatment appointments Monday through Friday during the day. They’ll pick them up at their home, bring them to the cancer center and bring them back home free of charge.
Lisa: Free of charge.
Cheryl: In that program what we tell the volunteers that work on that program, everyone makes an incredible difference, one person makes a huge difference.
Sue: They often make lifelong friendships because a lot of reasons that these volunteers are attracted to be a driver for the program is because cancer has touched their family in some way or even themselves personally. They make lifelong friendships with these people that they drive to their appointments. Very comforting because patients can’t always talk to their families about how they’re feeling so having a person that they don’t really know that well who may have some sort of cancer experience that they can share and talk about is good for them, not only for being able to get them to the treatment appointments but also psychosocially it’s a big help.
Cheryl: Also talking about transportation we partner with the Amtrak Downeaster to offer a Cancer Care Fare for folks from Maine to travel to Boston for care. There’s a reduced train fare available for them. Actually any of the resources that we kind of are talking about, folks can call our 800 number 800-227-2345 to find out information and how to sign up for the program. They all offer you like I said with the exception of the Cancer Care Fare, it’s is a reduced fare.
Sue: We have patient navigators.
Cheryl: We have been partners with two hospitals in Maine, Maine General and Maine Medical Center. Patient navigators are available to work with cancer patients in the treatment center on finding resources that they may need to get through their cancer journey.
Sue: It doesn’t necessarily mean resources related to the treatment. It can be related to “How can I obtain general assistance from my community to help me pay my bills while I’m going through cancer treatment?” or “I’m having difficulty with my insurance company. Can you help me untangle the web of bills?” and “How can I talk to my …” It’s non medical advice that these patient navigators offer but it’s so critical to helping a patient heal both emotionally and mentally.
Cheryl: They also talk to the caregivers which is also very important. We have a caregiver pilot that we actually offer you in a number of facilities in Maine where it’s just a finder of resource information but I’ll tell you it is, it is such valuable information because often times the caregiver doesn’t recognize what they might need. We try to work with them as well.
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Lisa: There are other things that you have available to help people with their healing process including your TLC, tender loving care catalogue of products that have to do with hair loss and mastectomies. Also your Look Good, Feel Better program that has to do with hair loss and skin changes and helping with that. Your support groups have reached a recovery man to man for prostate cancer.
I can cope for families just I feel like we could spend a lot of time talking about all of these different programs. It’s something that requires funding. How do you make the money that you need to support all of these programs to bring cancer support to patients and their families?
Sue: We actually have two signature events that happen in Maine. One is called Relay for Life that’s a team event where people come together and form teams that raise money. It’s an overnight event. It’s like a slumber party or a camp out however you want to think of it where they gather usually at local colleges or high schools on the track. In field they set up their tents and they have tent judging contests and those sorts of thing. Then a member of the team is asked to have one person on the track at all times and they’re usually anywhere between 12 and 18 hours in length.
The reason it’s an overnight event is cancer doesn’t sleep and so neither do these people. A couple of special parts of one of the Relay For Life is the beginning laugh which is to recognize cancer survivors and caregivers. They kick off the event with a laugh that is totally to honor them. People just line the track and applaud and encourage them on their walk around the track.
Then in the evening around 10 PM they have what’s called Luminaria ceremony. Luminaria is a paperbag with sand with a candle in it and people decorate it in honor of someone who survived cancer or in memory of someone who’s lost their battle and all their names are read and everyone walks by candlelight during that part of the evening. That raised $1.6 million for the American Cancer Society in Maine last year and then we have our Making Strides Against Breast Cancer Walk.
Cheryl: Making Strides Against Breast Cancer Walk it’s a three mile non-competitive walk and we are looking forward to the event in October. It raises money specifically for breast cancer research and programs and we typically have a couple of 1000 people that participate. It’s great day and a usually nice sunny day we hope in October.
Sue: People say why do we have breast cancer only walks why don’t we have a prostate walk or why don’t we have a pancreatic cancer walk. It’s because breast cancer research has led to discoveries that will help at least 17 other types of cancer. It’s not that we’re necessarily focusing just on that disease. It’s just that what you learn from one type of disease can translate into cures for other types of disease. I think it’s important for people to realize that.
Lisa: How can people find out about the American Cancer Society?
Sue: Well certainly we have a wonderful website. Its cancer.org. It’s available to 24/7 and you can go on at any time and it has great headers where you can choose where you want to go to learn more about research or to learn more about support programs or how you can help us raise money. Sally found a place there on the website where if you want to publish or have us publish a book, you can submit your ideas for that.
It’s an amazing website and then we also have our 800 number which is 800‑227-2345 and that also is the only cancer helpline number of it’s type in the world where we have live operators there 24/7. The most frequent time when people call are actually somewhere between midnight and 3 AM when they can’t sleep and their tossing and turning. They don’t want to wake up their family member to say, “Hey I’m having trouble sleeping,” so they just call these friendly voices and get the support they need.
Lisa: Well I’m very pleased that you’ve brought your own friendly voices in for our listeners to hear today and talked to us about all the great work that the Maine Chapter of the American Cancer Society and also the American Cancer Society nationally is doing. We’ve been speaking with Cheryl Tucker and Sue Clifford of the Maine Chapter of the American Cancer Society and I really encourage anyone who is interested in learning more to go to cancer.org or to call the 1‑800-227-2345 number to learn more about the types of things that are available to help support cancer patients and their families.
Cheryl: Thank you for having us today.
Sue: Thank you.
Lisa: We’re on the Dr. Lisa radio hour and podcast. Hope that our listeners enjoy their own work lives to the same extent we do and fully embrace every day. As a physician and small business owner I rely on Marci Booth from boothmaine to help me with my own business and to help me live my own life fully. Here are a few thoughts from Marci.
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Lisa: We’re back to Dr. Lisa radio hour. We like to think about health and wellness from a broader perspective and we brought in to help us think about this multiple artists over time who also think about health and wellness from a broader perspective. Today we have with us Sally Loughridge who is not only an artist but also has a background in psychology and a PhD in psychology. She is a breast cancer survivor who used her art to help her heal. Thank you for coming in and talking with us today Sally.
Sally: I’m happy to be here.
Lisa: Sally I have your book Rad Art in my hands. This is published by the American Cancer Society and it is beautiful. It contains paintings that you did while you were going through your cancer treatment.
Sally: That’s correct.
Lisa: Talk to me about this. Why was it so important for you to have this artistic outlet that you engaged in while you were going through this very medically oriented epic in your life?
Sally: I liked how you put it, an epic because it certainly was an epic in the journey and perhaps I’m still on it. Art has always been a very emotional and aesthetic process for me. It helps me connect with nature. It helps me connect with myself internally go deeper inside and understand more about myself and even surprise myself sometimes. Because I’ve been doing art here in Maine for so many years it was quite natural to think about painting my way through having cancer.
Lisa: Well actually I was going to say before you were an artist you’re a psychologist but really you’ve always been an artist.
Sally: That’s right I grew up with parents that always encouraged us to be creative, imaginative, to look for answers, to ask questions. My mother was a science teacher and very artistic herself. We were expected to make our own clothes. We entered art contests and each of my two sisters and I we each won our own sewing machine. It was sometimes like a sweatshop with all these sewing machines sitting there and we’re turning down our clothes.
It was very helpful to me in the sense of helping me believe in myself and that I could create things and do things and figure things out. I’ve always drawn and painted from as long as I can remember. I did not go to art school. I went to grad school and became a clinical psychologist. Even when I had a very busy practice in Vermont, I was painting. I’d come home from work and I’d paint. I had a show every year and that helped set a goal, that set a goal for me.
When I moved to Maine in 1999 with my husband or soon to be husband because there wasn’t licensing reciprocity for psychology between Vermont and Maine I decided to concentrate on my love of art and I’m very glad that I did.
Lisa: Why did you make that initial decision to go to graduate school in psychology and become a psychologist?
Sally: Actually I wanted to be a philosopher but I decided that that might be impractical. I didn’t envision myself teaching philosophy. Midway through college I switched from philosophy to psychology. I became fascinated by learning about human nature and I’ve always been drawn to children so when I went into my clinical work I did a lot of work with children and families. I saw adults as well but it really was the work with the kids that excited me. I also painted and drew with them or more accurately tried to help them use art, storytelling, puppet play, toys, other means of communication to express how they were feeling. It really was a bridge to them and to trust.
Lisa: Do you think that this is something that happens to us over time is that we maybe are more open as children to doing things like painting and engaging in artwork. Then as we get older if we haven’t, I’m putting quotes around this word “chosen” to be artists then we just decide it’s not that important anymore.
Sally: I think that’s right and I didn’t fully answer your question before I go back to that but I do know from research that’s been done and that kids say beneath roughly the age of 10, they are far less critical of themselves. When you get into puberty and you have more of a cognitive ability and neurological ability to analyze things and you become more self-critical and I think that discourages a lot of kids from using the inherent ability they have.
I think that all people have an ability to be imaginative and creative. It doesn’t mean they’re going to produce paintings or sculpture but we have an ability to think outside the box and sometimes that gets squashed. I went to school to become a psychologist I think largely because my family was very academic. It’s kind of an expectation you would go to a good college and then go on and do something significant to contribute. I used to love school. I might have wanted to be an eternal student so I loved being in graduate school because it was a chance to learn more and ask more questions and spend hours in the library.
Lisa: How have you incorporated your interest in philosophy into your psychology practice or your art?
Sally: Interesting I haven’t thought about that until this moment so let’s see. I don’t consciously do that but I’m sure that who I am in my own sense of spiritual connection to the world influences how I paint, how I think, and how I connect with other people. I don’t have a philosopher in mind that I then try to emulate or go back to.
Lisa: You’ve described a very thought-driven sort of approach to living and yet as part of your healing, your painting pictures in which you described to me you’re trying to disconnect from your thoughts.
Sally: That’s correct. Knowing myself pretty well not totally but pretty well, I’m pretty balanced on left and right hemispheres. I also strive to be a better and better artist as I go long as a professional artist. I also teach soft pastel painting and have for maybe 11 years now. I’m always thinking about how do you express an artistic principle or a technique. Lots of thought and I knew that in this case with the diagnosis of cancer that I might overthink the situation and bury some of my feelings.
I also knew as a psychologist that expressing myself, getting some of those thoughts out or feelings out would help me kind of rebalance myself. It’s an emotional roller coaster that a lot of people go on when they have cancer or other serious disorders or diseases. I set up some rules for myself about making these paintings in order to guard against caring what the painting looked like in the end, overthinking it and barring myself from knowing how I was feeling.
Lisa: Thoughts can be very tricky because we can sort of latch on to them and use them for our comfort and yet in cancer sometimes there are no explanations. Even if you are trying to think through something you won’t necessarily get anywhere.
Sally: I think that’s true and thankfully there’s a lot more research now and a lot more help around a number of cancers. There’s also so much information out there, not all of high quality or accuracy and with the ability to Google and search the Internet I find, I’ve heard this from other people who’ve had cancer or do have cancer, that they can get overwhelmed. They can overwhelm themselves by going to too many sites and in some sense that’s dangerous.
Lisa: Well I think that is part of the ability to kind of do a Google search and get information and have that be of some comfort but then there is always this uncertainty that no matter how much information you have and how much of it is relevant to your own life there’s still this not knowing, why did I get cancer or why me or did I do something wrong or …?
Sally: I don’t struggle with those questions and I’m glad it happened to me. What I do struggle which I’m still is do I still have it or will it come back? When people ask me, “How are you Sally?” I’ll say, “Fine” but if it’s with a close friend I might say, “Fine as far as I know.” There’s always an ‘if’ now. It makes life more precious and I think it deepens how one can experience and appreciate life. Everything felt out of control when you get cancer. It’s pretty overwhelming.
I mean I certainly felt I was too young to get cancer and how could it be and all that but this was a process I had control over. I got to structure it and I got to put cancer in its place in a way. Rather than having cancer define me like here I am breast cancer, here I am an artist who happened to get breast cancer that kind of stuff.
Lisa: I’m looking at some of the paintings in your book and these are 33 paintings over time that were done over the course of your radiation treatment. The first one is very obviously a right breast. Your right breast as my right breast day one but in the end you’ve gotten to day 33 good morning and it’s a picture of a beautiful, well I don’t know. I think it’s a tree and a bush like maybe a forsythia or an apple tree I’m not sure but it’s more landscapish.
Sally: That’s right.
Lisa: It seems as though there was an evolution over time in your paintings. Did you evolve as you were thinking about the way that you were thinking about the cancer and how it impacted you?
Sally: I think when … There are paintings in this series of 33. They were daily paintings except weekends off that when something emerged that was more representational, to me it showed that I was strengthening that I wasn’t so focused on the cancer. That felt good. There’s one fairly early on called I can’t remember what day it is but Out Of My Nowhere and it’s a painting that resembles in a very quick way some of the work that I normally do. That expression out of nowhere when I looked at the painting I had done became out of my nowhere. I was happy to see that.
Lisa: The goal of the Dr. Lisa radio hour is to help make connections between the health of the individual and health of the community. The goal of Ted Carter Inspired Landscapes is to deepen our appreciation for the natural world. Here to speak with us today is Ted Carter.
Ted: When one enters a nature preserve or a secluded wooded area we often think that we are the observer. Have you ever thought that upon entering such a space that we are in fact the observed? A thousand eyes are looking upon us. We can choose to see the natural world through hard eyes or soft eyes. Hard eyes make us separate from nature and also from other people. Soft eyes connect us to nature and to people around us.
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I’m Ted Carter and if you’d like to contact me, I can be reached at TedCarterdesign.com.
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Lisa: As you’re simultaneously trying to get rid of the cancer cells and also keep your other cells and your whole self healthy, how did the ability to come home and paint… how did that help that process?
Sally: It helped in a number of ways not all of which I recognized until after I’d gone through the process and some time had gone by. I knew that it could be cathartic because I know that by expressing something it can become less overwhelming and less fearful. I also knew that if I did something early in the morning so I scheduled my treatments as much as possible for very early in the morning. Then I would come home and do my painting and then write a few sentences about the painting as it looked at it.
I wanted to contain it so to speak so that I’d have the remainder of the day to use for my art and my life and my family. I think that really worked that way for me. The paintings also helped me look at some of my own feelings that I wasn’t aware of. Sometimes when you’re in traumatic situations or these medical situations you experience new emotions or ones that are so intense that it can not only scare you more but make you uncertain and like not knowing yourself.
When I did each painting when I looked at it afterwards being pretty analytical and psychologically minded, I feel like I learned more about myself. There are certain ones that surprised me. Like the one in the middle, day 17.
Lisa: Well talk to me about day 17. What’s that one?
Sally: Day 17 would be the exact middle of 33 treatments and so I went into this feeling, when I went off that morning for my treatment I felt happy relatively happy because I was half way done. I had gotten through half of it. I had the surgery I had gotten through half the radiation. The discomfort and the fatigue was increasing but I only had half way to go. I thought that I would paint quite a positive picture but if you look at the picture and I’ll try to describe it it’s a mass of blue area.
I think if I read how I described it, it will make it better to imagine it. “As I lay the blue in the shape soon came to represent completed treatments. The arrow shows the way forward. It both surprises and unsettles me that the arrow appears to be bisecting a breast no doubt my own. Apparently my unconscious self aggressively grabbed hold of my brush. What does my future hold?”
After I wrote that I named this painting Back to The Future. There was a movie like that so my idea was that I could back to my regular future but I now knew certainly that my future would always have an element around cancer.
Lisa: One of the paintings that you did was done on the day of your 65th birthday.
Sally: That’s right.
Lisa: I think many of us when we were younger have the sense that life goes on and definitely nothing bad is ever going to happen to us. We’re going to work hard. We’re going to get to a certain place in our lives and then we can shift around and start finally enjoying ourselves. You’re 65 and you’re going through radiation treatment. What did that feel like to all of a sudden realize that okay my life really is finite and it’s not going to look exactly the way I thought?
Sally: Certainly as I’ve gotten older I’ve been aware that life is finite and as people I’ve cared about have died or been ill that reinforces that certainty for you but to be 65 and on a radiation table did not feel particularly good. It also was kind of amusing because when you go for radiation and this they need to do, they always ask you your birthday. They need to make sure you’re the right person on the table and that they’re going to use the right what radiation protocol for where they aim their beams.
That day I remember going in and “what’s your birthday?” I said “4/5/45.” Suddenly one of them realized that’s today. Your birthday is today so there were a lot of happy birthdays and then we went on with it but the picture that I did when I came home that morning it took me back to when I used to go to the beach in Delaware with my family. I love the beach. That’s probably why I’m here in Maine and so it’s a very cloudy day on the beach. What I wrote at the end was that I wasn’t sure if the clouds were coming in or out, again my ambivalence and uncertainty.
Lisa: Sally how can people find out more about your book Rad Art or about your artwork?
Sally: The book is published by the American Cancer Society so if you go to cancer.org and you scroll down to find the bookshop and then click on that then the book will pop up. It’s also available on many distributors online and in some bookstores. It’s also now apparently available as an eBook through the cancer society and Amazon and other places.
I don’t have one yet but it’s available. If you want to find out more about the book and the process, there’s a YouTube video of me talking about the book and that you can access by Googling Rad Art and then my name, last name, Loughridge and that should pop up among other writings and reviews of this book. As for my artwork which is the real me if you go to www.sallyloughridge.com you’ll find lots of examples.
Lisa: Sally it’s been a pleasure to spend time talking with you about your book Rad Art and also I appreciate your bringing examples of your painting into the studio because it certainly has made this all come alive for me in a very profound way. We’ve been speaking with Sally Loughridge who’s a Maine artist and author of the book Rad Art.
Sally: Thank you I really enjoyed being here and having a chance to express some of these ideas with you and my journey.
Lisa: Today in the studio I have with me Caroline Knight who is a research coordinator or the research coordinator I should say for the Pen Bay Medical Center Research Department just off the coast from us here in Maine. She’s going to talk to us about something that I suspect many people don’t even realize is going on which is medical research and cancer research in particular in the State of Maine so thanks for coming in.
Caroline: Thank you.
Lisa: Caroline this is something that I have some background and I actually did cancer research when I was a medical student and early on in my medical training and so I know that it was going on in Maine because I was doing it back it was awhile ago but it is something that most people don’t really quite realize. We think well how could we have something like medical research which takes resources, it takes people, it takes academicians? How could we have that in the State of Maine?
Caroline: Well fortunately with cancer research it’s all coordinated mostly through the National Cancer Institute and there are major coordinating centers that do a lot of that work and then they find centers around the country to do the actual patient care. You can be a small institution and link in to the work being done at that National Cancer Institute.
Lisa: This is in fact is what has recently happened with Pen Bay.
Caroline: Yes we have become an affiliate of Eastern Maine Medical Center which is a member of the large cooperative groups under the National Cancer Institute.
Lisa: What type of cancer research is being done at Pen Bay?
Caroline: Right now we’ve opened four studies just recently three of them in breast cancer and one in colon cancer and we plan to open several others soon.
Lisa: Why is it important to do cancer research in smaller communities and smaller states like Maine?
Caroline: So that the local people have access to the cutting edge medicine that’s being done and so that the research is being done on people from all over the world, all over the country. People genetically who’ve been in Maine several generations are different genetically than those who’ve been in say Alabama for several generations.
Lisa: Are there benefits to actually doing this research in Maine that we might not have say if we were in Boston or a larger urban center? Does it enable you to connect with people because you know who the patients are in the community?
Caroline: Yes we have such a small institution that we know everyone and there’s only one oncologist so we are able to know every patient. We don’t have to go out and recruit and talk to other physicians and try and get them to send us patients because if there are cancer patients being seen in the mid coast area in Pen Bay Hospital they are being seen by our oncologist.
Lisa: Before Pen Bay starting doing cancer research Pen Bay was doing other types of research.
Caroline: Yes. Pen Bay has been involved in various research studies a few in the 1980’s, 1990’s, the early 2000’s several in neurology department or also a pulmonary study or two and asthma. Then when I came to work here, I have been doing research for 20 years and when I came to work at Pen Bay I thought I’d never be able to do research again and found a niche in the anti coagulation clinic and brought in research studies that I had been doing in my previous job in Colorado. From that we’ve grown a department. Now there are two full time study coordinators myself and another one.
Lisa: If I’m a patient or a doctor and I have a disease like breast cancer, how do I know if there is a cancer study being done in my area?
Caroline: The National Cancer Institute has a website with listings where you can put in say your zip code and it will help you find a center or ask your physician. They are generally in tune to such things.
Lisa: A local physician up in the mid coast area will know that there are research studies being done at Pen Bay and can connect with patients that way.
Caroline: They should. We have just started and so we’re getting the word out but they are also usually aware of studies being done say in Portland or at the Alfond center in Augusta or in Brewer.
Lisa: You’re not originally from Maine? No? You’re from elsewhere.
Caroline: Yes.
Lisa: From away yes and that’s okay we like people from away. Why did you move to Maine?
Caroline: For the lifestyle. I decided it was time for a change and I missed the ocean, liked the slower pace and liked the idea of being able to get to know my neighbors. I love working at the small hospital and getting to know so many of the people I work with.
Lisa: You live in Rockland now?
Caroline: Yes.
Lisa: How have you found … Well you came from Colorado originally so the winters how do they compare?
Caroline: The can be pretty depressing here compared to Colorado where it’s snowy but sunny. Here it gets grey sometimes and I can certainly see the allure of going south for a vacation in the winter.
Lisa: We’re happy that it’s summer now.
Caroline: Yes. This is why we live here.
Lisa: This is why we live here.
Caroline: This time of the year.
Lisa: Maine in summer. How can people find out about the research that you’re doing at Pen Bay Medical Center?
Caroline: They can visit our website penbayhealthcare.org. There’s information there or they can call the research center which is 207-596-8959.
Lisa: Well I’m thrilled to know that there is great work being done in medical research at Pen Bay and I know at other places around the state and it’s nice to know that we have very smart people who are coming in and trying to figure out how to treat some of these diseases like cancer and multiple sclerosis and some of the other things that we talked about so thank you for coming in and talking to me today. We’ve been speaking with Caroline Knight who’s the research coordinator at the Pen Bay Medical Center Research Department off the coast.
Caroline: Thank you.
Lisa: You’ve been listening to the Dr. Lisa radio hour and podcast show number 95 Art and the American Cancer Society. Our guests have included Sue Clifford and Cheryl Tucker, Sally Loughridge and Caroline Knight. For more information on our guests visit doctorlisa.org. The Dr. Lisa radio hour and podcast is downloadable for free on iTunes. For a preview of each week’s show sign up for our E-newsletter and like our Dr. Lisa Facebook page.
You can also follow up me on Twitter and Pinterest doctorlisa and read my take on health and well being on the [inaudible 00:57:08] of a blog. We love to hear from you so please let us know what you think of the Dr. Lisa radio hour. We welcome your suggestions for future shows. Also let our sponsors know that you’ve heard about them here. We’re privileged that they enable us to bring the Dr. Lisa radio hour to you each week.
This is Dr. Lisa Belisle hoping that you have enjoyed our Art and the American Cancer Society show. Thank you for allowing me to be a part of your day. May you have a bountiful life.
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The Dr. Lisa radio hour and podcast is recorded at the studios of Maine Magazine at 75 Market Street in Portland, Maine. Our executive producers are Kevin Thomas and Dr. Lisa Belisle. Audio production and original music by John C McCain. Our assistant producer is Leanne Ouimet. Become a subscriber of Dr. Lisa Belisle on iTunes. See the Dr. Lisa website or Facebook page for details. Summaries of all our past shows can be found at doctorlisa.org.