Three weeks before I’m scheduled to get on a plane to London to shoot a show I’ve been excited about for six months, I am diagnosed with breast cancer.
Didn’t see that coming? Welcome to my world. I’m supposed to be prepping for the shoot and taking my kids to Disneyland, but instead I’m engulfed in a tornado of mammograms, MRIs, biopsies, second opinions, third opinions, and general what-the-fuckery. I’ve also sprained my ankle (why not?) and as I leave the 7th of what will be 15 medical appointments this week, it’s clear that I’m no longer in the “best case scenario” of three years ago when I was diagnosed the first time. I crutch back to my car, a mix of shock, anger and bruises forming on my ribs. The crutches dig into a biopsy site in my right breast which has just been called “a goner” by a leading surgical oncologist. Insult to injury in the most tangible way.
In an act of mercy, I’m cleared to go to London to shoot the show, but only because the recommendation is a double mastectomy upon return. It’s an early stage cancer that’s contained to a duct; is this not killing an ant with a sledgehammer? Apparently not, because it’s my second time and my 42nd birthday is in three days. There is too much risk now – too many years ahead for another recurrence. The girls have to go, but I’m allowed to do the show.
By the 13th appointment, I’m on a knee scooter because my ankle is getting worse rather than better. This time we see a plastic surgeon who walks us through breast reconstruction options. As we try to find our car in the massive lot afterward, we realize we’re on the wrong level; we’ve gone up too high. I eye the elevator, think of every scary thing I just heard about implants and take off on the knee scooter, riding it downward like a sled, feeling wind rush through my hair after a week of being trapped in my body. My husband runs behind me yelling “Watch out for cars!” I toss back “Think of the trouble you’ll be spared if I don’t!” We both laugh the way you only can when the gallows are closing in.
We spend the next two weeks with our family of friends. With my mobility challenged, they fill our home with laughter, surrounding us and our kids with love. It is a thing of beauty to have the people in your life show up to guide you through the shadowy bits. But it’s a thing of horror to see the fear in their eyes as they process your return to a gauntlet you all thought you’d left behind. With the trip impending, we say goodbyes – hard ones. The ones laced with “this will all be ok” when no one really knows if it’s true.
It’s time to pack, but I still can’t walk. I crawl (literally. fucking. crawl.) around the house to pack us up for two months abroad. I don’t have an explanation as to why the ankle pain is still so bad, but am told I’m about to turn the corner. My ortho demands bed rest again, so I rage briefly then decide to get to work. I’ll start prepping my scripts and creating my character. Stuck in bed, I begin to build Sarah Campbell, and I love her immediately. She’s hope and optimism at a time when I really need it.
Off we go to England. I’m wheel-chaired through the airport because I can’t crutch that far with the bruises on my ribs growing darker. I pretend it’s a fun ride for my 6 year old but I’m feeling ever more trapped in my body. As an anxious person, I need exercise to calm my nervous system. Without it, the overwhelm is rising. I feel mounting fear that this ankle sprain could impact the shoot if I don’t turn the corner and walk. The flight goes well. Three & Six Year Old both sleep and I think “ok, miracles do happen, maybe this really will be ok.”
A week later, I still can’t walk without extreme pain. I go to the table read in a boot and crutches, terrified that I’m about to ruin this show. But as we read through the episodes, what happens in that room can only be described as magic. My love for this particular writer, John Morton, deserves its own blog. His scripts are unlike anything else. They’re not just story, they’re music. I’ve heard him compared to Sorkin, but I think Sondheim is more appropriate. The lines alternate between melody and dissonance in a brilliant, beautiful chorus. It’s a character-based orchestra of optimism and ambition mixed with failure and flaws. This is unique to John and as actors, everyone knows they’re lucky to be there with his material in hand. We read the full season in a room that can only be described as a sauna, which would typically be the death of comedy. But this cast, this glorious cast, makes every line sail through the sticky air. I don’t know how many hours we spend in that room sweating and laughing, but it’s far too many and far too few at the same time. It’s obvious we have something special on our hands.
I go to my cast medical. I could spend an hour trying to describe the way this poor physician reacts to what was supposed to be a routine exam to get me insured for the shoot. I walk in on crutches with the boot, enough of a disaster, and then I hit him with cancer. I’m already cleared by production, but he’s personally devastated for me. He’s kind. For a very long time only he, producers and my darling makeup artist Flora know. There is no way I’m about to go through this summer seeing pity in everyone else’s eyes.
Turns out that will happen anyway, because my sprained ankle ends up involving nerve damage and I spend 6 more weeks on crutches. There’s so much to say here, but I’m going to gloss over it because it’s a nightmare. The part worth sharing is that incredible thing that happens in hardship when humans step up without being asked. The cast & crew care for me like family. They carry my crutches out of frame once I’m settled into the shot, rearrange scenes, book medical appointments, refill my water bottle, get my ice packs & meds, my tea, my snacks, help me to the bathroom (yes), push the wheelchair when my body is so universally broken that I can’t crutch anymore from the set to my dressing room. And a few of them take especially good care of my heart.
It may be obvious at this point, dear reader, but I like to turn outward and soak in the people around me. It’s a coping mechanism that’s proven more effective than the alcohol or repression I tried in my youth. I can sit & stew OR I can try to bring some else joy. I have found my life’s purpose in the latter. When I mark time by making people laugh, making them feel loved & supported, I feel connected. I feel that I matter (loads to unpack there, surely.)
Here I am, surrounded by the kindest folks you can ask for. It’s never lost on me that I’ve been gifted this particular shoot with this specific material and these exact people. I am flooded with gratitude every day.
Up until the final weeks of filming, I compartmentalize the cancer completely. I’m focused on doing my job and being able to walk again. Once the nerve damage is properly diagnosed, I get a nerve block and finally turn that elusive corner. The first scene we do as I take unsupported steps is into Alexis’ office. Nicole conceals my crutches under her desk & I see her body tense up, ready to catch me if I fall. The set goes silent as I walk from her desk to Alexis’ open hand; it’s all of 6 feet, but it’s the Grand Canyon. Everyone applauds as if we have a toddler on set taking her first steps. I feel like I’ve been given my life back. Finally, freedom.
With two weeks of filming to go, I’m a new woman on that set. Free to go anywhere I please and free of feeling like a burden to everyone around me. We’re going to finish this thing with plenty of shots of me walking around! We’re going to finish this thing with me actually enjoying London and all it has to offer! We’re going to finish this thing and – oh my god, we’re going to finish this thing and I have cancer.
The compartmentalization falters. The dam starts to disintegrate and leaks spring forth. Deep beneath my gratitude, fear has been lying in wait and its time has come.
Running lines in the green room with the cast, the music halts with the drop of a line, followed by laughter when I realize it’s me who lost the rhythm and – holy shit, I’m going to lose part of my body.
Standing in our set kitchen lining up a shot, chatting with our DP about his adorable son’s newfound affinity for foul language and – how do I tell my boys that Mommy’s sick?
Talking to a costar about what he’s shooting next, followed by him asking what I have on the horizon and – how long will it be before I’m well enough to work again?
Shooting a group scene where the primary goal is to get useable footage without anyone shaking from laughter and – what if this surgery doesn’t go well and this is the last shoot I ever do?
I can’t hold this in anymore. Over the course of a few days, I look my new friends in the eyes and tell them the secret I’ve been stuffing down for months. That my ankle is the least of my problems and gosh, I’m so sorry to drop this bomb on you and no, you don’t have to find the right words and yes, I should be ok. To a person, they respond beautifully. Of course they do.
For the final two weeks, I have allies in my fight for composure. I get to finish the show feeling the kind of support I get at home – the kind that leaves me more whole than I have any right to feel given the circumstances. Jimena holds my hand and my heart, Alexis brings me the matcha lattes he clocked me ordering the first week, Stephen (who had done the aforementioned wheelchair pushing) makes me feel protected, Paulo makes me feel seen & safe, Nick gifts me that ever-holy medicine of laughter and Hugh glues to my side in the final, scariest days as we wrap the shoot together, our two characters facing hardships of their own. I am essentially scaffolded by a group of strangers who’ve become family. A flag is planted in London and a piece of my heart will live here forever.
Suddenly, it’s time to go home. The shoot is over and the incredible distraction it provided has given way to the reality that I am, in fact, sick. As I trade sound stages for operating rooms, the complete erasure of ego begins.
I’ve lived in a world of utter surreality for months and my brain, heart & body are trying to fuse back together. Writing this feels like a good step toward that end – and I thank you very much for reading my story. I know some of you will ask what you can do; nothing but send your love to me & my family as we enter the next chapter. Perhaps say a prayer that the new breasts might be even better than the ones I’ve loved these 42 years?
Keep an eye out for the release date of Twenty Twenty Six, of which I simply could not be more proud. It is filled with people without whom I wouldn’t be who I am in this exact moment in time.
But most importantly, please, please, please, do your monthly self breast exams. Had I not been doing mine three years ago, literally everything in this story would be different.
I’ll leave you with a parting thought from my character Sarah that’s been bouncing around my head for days now:
“From now on, things are going to be different, right? Because they have to be.”
Chelsey Crisp Blog 