Introduction

The stirring true story of a woman who chose fearlessness in the face of a fatal family legacy and discovered the pleasure of living each moment to its fullest

At thirty-two, Amy Boesky thought she had it all figured out: a wonderful new man in her life, a great job, and the (nearly) perfect home. For once, she was almost able to shake the terrible fear that had gripped her for as long as she could remember. Women in her family had always died young-from cancer-and she and her sisters had grown up in time's shadow. It colored every choice they made and was beginning to come to a head now that each of them approached thirty-five-the deadline their doctors prescribed for having preventive surgery with the hope they could thwart their family's medical curse. But Amy didn't want to dwell on that now. She wanted to plan for a new baby, live her life. And with the appreciation for life's smallest pleasures, she did just that. In What We Have, Amy shares a deeply transformative year in her family's life and invites readers to join in their joy, laughter, and grief.

In a true story as compelling as the best in women's fiction, written with the sagacity of Joan Didion and the elegance of Amy Bloom, Amy Boesky's journey celebrates the promise of a full life, even in the face of uncertainty.

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Excerpt

P R O L O G U E

ON MARCH 25, 1993, AT the end of a long, unusually snowy winter,

I got a letter from the chair of the Department of Preventive

Medicine and Public Health at Creighton University. They’d been

following the cluster of cancers in our family since the 1980s, and

they wanted to report what they’d learned. They listed statistics, numbers,

names of “fi rst-” and “second-degree” relatives. I read the letter

twice. I looked down at Elisabeth, our newborn, who looked back at

me with that uncanny infant mixture of myopia and focus. Sacha, our

toddler, was upstairs napping.

I folded the letter up and put it away.

I knew this was big news. Even in my postpartum haze, I got

that.

But there was a lot I couldn’t fathom. I didn’t realize how much

the story we’d grown up with was about to change, how much of a

difference it would make, rearranging what we knew—what we thought

we knew—about our family history. Seeing connections where we

hadn’t before. Seeing fi ssures and breaks where before there’d been

smooth, connecting lines.

THIS STORY IS ABOUT WHAT it’s been like for one family—mine—to

live with risk.

It isn’t really a cancer story, or a survivor story, though it has

cancer and surviving in it. Instead, it’s a previvor’s story. A previvor is

someone who doesn’t have cancer, but has a known (elevated) risk for

it, discovered through family history or through diagnosis with a genetic

mutation. That’s good news. If you’re a previvor, you don’t have

anything—at least, not yet.

The bad news is, that means you don’t have anything to fi x or

get better from. You can diagnose being a previvor, but you can’t treat

it. There are things you can do, protocols to follow. But the previvor

part doesn’t go away. It just becomes part of who you are.

Previvors are a new group—the word hasn’t been around for

long—but we’re growing in number every day. By the time this book

is fi nished, there will be thousands more of us. It’s peculiar and compelling,

this glimpse ahead—in some ways a curse, in others, a gift.

I used to think all my favorite words began with pre. Preface.

Prepare. Prevaricate. Pregnancy (that one doesn’t belong etymologically,

but still). Pre for “prior to; earlier than.” Ahead of. I’ve always

loved being early: the fi rst to board the plane; the fi rst to get a new

piece of technology. The fi rst to plan. Preview. Premonition. Prevent.

Would I have chosen this kind of preview on purpose?

I go back and forth. I talk about it with my sisters. Some days,

the answer, emphatically, is no. Who wants to know her genetic destiny

and have to live with the consequences? Who wants to sit down and

tell her daughters about this? Girls, guess what? We have this gene—

Other days, I’m more upbeat. I tell myself having to live with

consequences isn’t the point. It’s getting to live. Maybe even choosing

to live. For that, seeing ahead is worth it.

Two different points of view, and I have both.

There’s a shaped poem I’ve always liked by George Herbert which

modern editors call “Easter Wings.” Most editors lay it out vertically,

so the two stanzas (shaped like triangles) stand, inverted, on a single

page. Set like that, it looks like an hourglass. But if you turn the poem

sideways, it looks like wings.

That’s how it is for me, thinking about the future. Two different

shapes. One holding time; the other escaping it. One suggesting fragility,

confi nement; the other, something transcendent. Turn it one

way, you see an hourglass. Turn it the other way, and you see wings. view abbreviated excerpt only...

Discussion Questions

1. What factors do you think contributed to this? Does the history of the relationships among the sisters become a factor here?
What do you think about the three sisters’ decision to have both prophylactic oophorectomies 2. and mastectomies? Would you have made the same choice?
With the advent of at-home genome sequencing, we will very soon have the ability to know 3. about illnesses that might affect us down the road. Do you think it’s better to know or not to know?
Discuss the different layers of meaning in the title of Amy’s memoir.
4.
Amy and her husband Jacques are in almost constant opposition with regard to planning for the 5. future. With whom do you most identify? Is it better to take preemptive action or to take things as they come?
Knowing that hereditary cancers tend to strike approximately ten years earlier with each 6. succeeding generation, what do you think would be the best way for Amy to prepare her daughters?
How did Amy’s historical information about timepieces and her reflections on the regular 7. calendar versus the “Cancer Calendar” affect the story?
When Amy returns to teaching after Sacha is born, she writes, “I watched Sacha crawl into 8. Annabel’s open arms with a bitter taste in my mouth. There’s nothing generous about love, I decided” (p. 260). Are there any other instances in the book to which this sentiment could apply?
What is the function of the “forever house” and Amy and Jacques’s journey to find it?
9.
To paraphrase Amy’s own exam question: how does the author define herself “in opposition to 10. an “other” or antagonist” (p. 52)? Think about what she includes in her self-representation as well as what she leaves out.
After Amy loses her mother, she attempts to keep “bomma’s” memory alive for her two 11. daughters—repeating her own parents’ attempts to keep Sylvia alive for her and her sisters. Are the benefits of preserving family memories worth the risk that the girls might come to dwell on their forbears’ early deaths?
Discuss some examples of how Amy’s love of language and wordplay helps her process difficult 12. feelings and experiences. Have you ever relied upon a similar device?
Has hereditary illness played a role in your personal history? How do Amy’s experiences 13. resonate with your own?

Weblinks

»	Publisher's Book Info
»	Official Web Site for What We Have
»	What We Have Facebook Page

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