RECENT STORIES

Wanted: Loving Laps and Forever Homes ( Kitty L Angell )
“A Taste of Colorado” Reminder-Ash Ganley Performs ( Artopia Arts Activist )
Blotter: Man robs King Soopers on Table Mesa ( Boulder Police )
United Way's 2008 Day Of Caring Sets New Records ( Pat Monacelli )
RUN FOR CONGO WOMEN ( Jennifer Parsons )

share a story | more postings »

YourHub.com \\ Boulder \\ Stories \\ Promotions \\ Race for the Cure

Two-time survivor is well grounded

e-mail to a friend | print this | link to this

NEXT › ‹ PREVIOUS

Contributed by: Dana Brandorff on 9/26/2007

Selina Eng Tsien has had breast cancer. Twice. But this Boulder resident has always known where things stood in her life, and what was important. Before her first lump was found, she had a busy full time job in Administration at CU-Boulder. When her cyst turned out to be a breast cancer tumor, she "thought it was a death sentence," didn't know anything about it, didn't know there were support groups, didn't know there were resources. Worse yet, she had done everything right. "I was eating right, active, no smoking or drinking." And most of her cooking was native to her Chinese cooking, "lots of vegetables." It still is.

After her lumpectomy, chemo and radiation, she decided she didn't want to put all her days into work. She found another woman to job share with her and conserved her energy. She knew a full time job was more than she wanted to handle, and that being with her husband and two children came first. "It was great," she said about the way they divided up the workload-she did the administration, her partner did the arrangements. Selina also found the Rocky Mountain Survivor Team in Boulder and went every Thursday night to a sports medicine office to exercise-plus hiking, snowshoeing and more outdoor activities with the group. "Being active" became "being athletic " with other people who had survived cancer.

In 2004 came round two, unfortunately. At 48, Selina had a bi-lateral mastectomy. Although her second cancer was a separate cancer, not a recurrence of her first --greatly increasing her chances of survival -- she said she is a big supporter of bi-lateral mastectomy. She said of chemo and radiation "it's really torture, physically," and she had no interest in dealing with it ever again. But this time she had lot's more resources, knew more about her disease. She'd attended the Day of Caring in May, where she got lots of information and heard from multiple incidence survivors. She knew she could handle it, even though her second cancer was a HER2 cancer, protein-related and very aggressive. Somehow it was easier, having more information and having spent time with strong, healthy survivors---having recovered once before. But she was done with working. "Office problems you can never finish," she said, "there is always another one." Although she liked her work, it was time to save her energy and creativity for her family.

Selina is very comfortable with herself, with her body, and with the choices she has made. "I have mentally accepted where I am," she added. When you talk to her, there is no doubt about it.

And she's quite at home with where she is.

Join us on Sunday, October 7 for the 15th Annual Komen Denver Race for the Cure at Pepsi Center. For more information on who Komen is, what it does for the community and how to register, visit www.komendenver.org.

[Report this as objectionable content.]

SUBMIT COMMENT

Rate the above story

Current Rating

Based on 1 user ratings.

Talk Back : submit comments to the story

*Note: you need to log-in to add a comment or rating.

Thank you! Your comment has been updated.

CONTRIBUTOR INFORMATION

Dana Brandorff

Littleton , CO

Dana Brandorff has posted 52 stories and 0 comments since joining on 9/14/2005. Dana Brandorff 's average story rating is 5.

view profile » view other postings from Dana Brandorff »

SAVE AND SHARE THIS STORY

digg	Google
del.icio.us	Yahoo!
reddit	Newsvine

What is this?

STORY RSS FEEDS

All stories

All stories in Boulder

All stories by Dana Brandorff

WANT TO WRITE FOR YOURHUB.COM?

Want to see the stories you write and the photos you shoot featured in the YourHub.com Thursday print section available all over the Front Range and with home subscriptions of the Rocky Mountain News and The Denver Post? All you have to do is register, then post a story or column, start a blog or tell everyone what events are happening in town. We will print the best stories, columns, event listings, photos and blog entries in our print sections.

Loading Ad