Today’s guest is Stephanie Kinkel reading her piece from Wildfire Magazine’s February 2021 issue called “Bay Area Young Survivors.” Stephanie was diagnosed with breast cancer at 39. She carries the gene mutation ATM. Stephanie and her sister were quite young when they lost their parents to cancer. Thus, Stephanie says, she was not altogether surprised to discover her own lumps or the genetic predisposition. Her piece is called “Permanent.” It’s about losing your hair to chemo; but, it’s never “just hair.” Today’s story is about a relationship between a mother and a daughter, and about loss - of identity, of hair, of a mom. And it’s about the discovery of a new identity and those astonishing chemo curls.
