A good breakup

We headed into the City first thing this morning for my MRI at the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center building on East 55^th Street, followed by my appointment with Dr. Lisa DeAngelis at the Outpatient Pavilion on East 53^rd Street. My last MRI had been on February 6^th of 2018, nearly twenty-one months ago.

The news is good – I am still in the clear! So, after we chatted for a few minutes, it was not entirely surprising when Dr. DeAngelis said that there is no need for me to schedule any further routine follow-up appointments with her.

I first saw Dr. DeAngelis in the spring of 2012. The primary CNS lymphoma had been diagnosed at Mount Sinai Hospital, but because it is a relatively rare tumor, the doctors and staff there did not have much experience treating it, and much to their credit, those doctors encouraged us to head over to Dr. DeAngelis at MSKCC. The rest, as they say, is history.

As I was writing this, I entered “Lisa DeAngelis” into Google and lo and behold came across something I had somehow completely missed earlier last month:

Neuro-Oncologist Lisa M. DeAngelis Has Been Named Physician-in-Chief and Chief Medical Officer of Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center

Lisa M. DeAngelis Has Been Named Physician-in-Chief and Chief Medical Officer of MSK

Tuesday, September 10, 2019

After an extensive nationwide search, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSK) announced today that Lisa M. DeAngelis has been named Physician-in-Chief and Chief Medical Officer. A leading expert in brain cancer, Dr. DeAngelis previously served as Chair of the Department of Neurology and was co-founder of MSK’s Brain Tumor Center during her 30-plus-year tenure at the institution.

“Lisa is an internationally renowned physician, collaborative colleague, and fierce advocate for both patients and faculty,” said Craig B. Thompson, MSK President and CEO. “Her expertise and unique understanding of MSK’s mission make her the ideal person to lead MSK’s clinical enterprise into the future.”

As Physician-in-Chief, Dr. DeAngelis will direct the entire clinical care enterprise and continuum of care at MSK, leading a staff of cancer experts that includes more than 1,200 hospital attendings and almost 4,000 registered nurses. She will be responsible for the management of all patient care services across the MSK system, including a 500-bed inpatient hospital, 13 outpatient facilities in New York City, and seven regional care sites throughout New York and New Jersey. She will also focus on clinical strategic planning and will oversee MSK’s robust clinical and translational research programs.

“Over the course of her career, Lisa has been a leader of strength and integrity and is widely recognized for her vast knowledge of MSK, her extensive experience in treating cancer, and her extraordinary skill as a physician. She is also a gifted communicator, and there is no one better suited for this trailblazing role,” said Scott M. Stuart, Chairman of the Boards of Overseers and Managers of MSK.

Dr. DeAngelis joined MSK as a neuro-oncology fellow in 1985, working with Jerome Posner, who was MSK’s founding Chair of Neurology. She became a critical member of MSK’s leadership team in 1997, when she was appointed Chair of the Department of Neurology, a position she held until assuming the Acting Physician-in-Chief role in September 2018. She co-founded MSK’s Brain Tumor Center, where experts from across MSK work to bring new discoveries from the lab to patients as quickly as possible. Her research has focused on primary brain tumors and the neurological complications of cancer and its treatment, such as cognitive impairment and strokes. She helped develop the current regimen to treat primary central nervous system lymphoma and has led numerous national clinical trials that investigate new brain tumor therapies.

Dr. DeAngelis is an elected member of the National Academy of Medicine and a fellow of the American Academy of Neurology and the American Neurological Association. She also served previously on the board of directors for the Society for Neuro-Oncology.

“I am privileged to be taking on the role of Physician-in-Chief at this amazing organization. Our exceptional team of doctors, nurses, researchers, and staff is dedicated to providing the best, most advanced, and compassionate care to our patients. It is an honor to lead and work alongside them,” said Dr. DeAngelis.  

MSK is one of 50 institutions in the United States that has been designated a Comprehensive Cancer Center by the National Cancer Institute, affirming our leadership in research, patient care, and education. MSK is an American Nurses Credentialing Center Magnet^®–designated institution, based on nursing excellence. In 2018, more than 24,000 patients were admitted to Memorial Hospital, and more than 173,000 patients were seen at our Manhattan and regional facilities.

From where I sit, MSKCC would have been hard pressed to make a better selection!

Love,

Rebecca

Sunshine

Here is something guaranteed to brighten any cold and rainy day like the one we are having here in New York.

Love,

Rebecca

Trying to get back on

I am somewhat nervously returning to my blogging, hoping that the “problems” I was having have resolved. Meanwhile, with the continued possibility that I will in fact need to privatize this endeavor, I would still encourage you to follow my previous instructions on logging in, which are included in an e-mail message you should have received from Blogger on October 18^th. I will resend that message if needed.

Last week’s “Mini” crossword puzzle in the New York Times had an especially relevant item:

Clue: On line diary, of sorts (four letters)

Answer: BLOG

Our family spent most of the past two weeks celebrating the holiday of Sukkot.

Sukkot is a weeklong Jewish holiday that comes five days after Yom Kippur. Sukkot celebrates the gathering of the harvest and commemorates the miraculous protection G‑d provided for the children of Israel when they left Egypt. We celebrate Sukkot by dwelling in a foliage-covered booth (known as a sukkah) and by taking the “Four Kinds” (arba minim), four special species of vegetation.

https://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/4784/jewish/What-Is-Sukkot.htm

Like all Jewish holidays, it involves quite a lot of eating, and we have had lots of wonderful food with our daughters and their families.

I share a picture of Eliana and Maya with us in the Sukkah here, as well as a lovely greeting sent out by the Jewish Day School in Sharon. You probably recognize that adorable little girl on the left!

After ten wonderful days in Sharon, we returned to New York on Sunday. We were looking forward to an enjoyable last two days of the fall holiday season but unfortunately Barry had a toothache which sidelined us a bit. He was finally able to see the dentist today after my 28^th pembrolizumab infusion, so is hopefully on the mend now.

They say that you cannot teach an old dog new tricks, and perhaps they are right. Our friend, composer and jazz pianist Leslie Pintchik, has just released a new album called, "Same Day Delivery." With Barry's help, I went onto iTunes to purchase this terrific collection, and when Barry saw what I was typing, he said "why do you have to ask it for same day delivery? It should just download immediately!" I had to remind him that the name of her new CD is.....

Have a good week!

Love,

Rebecca

Big Day for Noah

Tomorrow is Noah’s third birthday, and we were fortunate to be able to share the celebration at his school, which will be followed by a whole family party at Shabbat lunch tomorrow.

At the risk of sounding immodest, how cute is this little guy? He really is as adorable as he looks in the pictures. And he is a true member of our family: he attacked his birthday cupcake with great determination and skill, barely missing a drop.

We also had a chance to stop over at Shaloh House, a local Jewish pre-school of which Simmie is now in her second year as Preschool and Early Childhood Care Director. The school underwent some recent renovations, and we got the full tour. Meeting all the teachers with their glowing compliments of our daughter was total naches! For those of you who don’t know that Yiddish word, I looked it up and the first match provided the perfect definition:

Naches (נחת) is a Yiddish word that means "pride" or "joy." Typically, naches refers to the pride or joy that a child brings a parent.

Have a great weekend!

Love,

Rebecca

An unexpected honor

As I was getting settled in my seat on the second day of Rosh Hashana (Jewish New Year), one of our synagogue’s female clergy came up to me and asked if I would like to have an honor during the ritual blowing of the shofar (ram’s horn), namely, to call out one of the series of nine notes for the ba’al tekia (fellow blowing the shofar). This was apparently not the first time that women had been given this honor at the Hebrew Institute of Riverdale, but, due to health issues, I had not been in synagogue the last couple of years, so I was relatively unaware of it. Moments after I said “yes,” it began to sink in, and I thought “what in the world was I thinking? Can I really get up there and do this?”

By the time we reached that third set of shofar blasts to which I had been assigned, I was in position and, I suppose, as ready as I could be. But what I did not expect was just how emotional a moment it would become. The blowing of the shofar is a key component of the Rosh Hashana ritual and I was about to experience an honor that is only rarely offered to women in traditional synagogues. I am happy to say that I did manage to maintain my composure, and afterwards the two other women and I exchanged appropriate “high fives” and greetings before returning to our seats.

I can only hope that this bodes well for the coming year, that it will be one of many joyful opportunities and milestones for all of us.

Love,

Rebecca

Talk about stuff that makes no sense

This morning we received an e-mail from our bank with the subject line:

Your FICO Score changed, Barry

When I clicked on the link and logged in to our account, I found that our credit score had dropped over the past six months from over 800 (“Exceptional”) to a bit under 800 (“Very Good”). This was followed by an explanation:

Key Factor(s) Affecting Your FICO^® Score:

Lack of recent installment loan information

FICO^® Scores consider recent non-mortgage installment loans (such as auto or student loans) information on a person’s credit report. Your score was impacted because your credit report shows no recent non-mortgage installment loans or insufficient recent information about your loans.

Too few accounts currently paid as agreed

FICO^® Scores consider the number of accounts that are paid as agreed. Your score was impacted because the number of these accounts is too low, or because you've missed payments recently on some of your accounts.

In other words, we are being penalized – penalized! – for paying everything on time and being good and responsible citizens!

I wanted to learn more, so I scrolled down a bit, I found the following in the description of credit scores:

Score Deciding Factors

I was only able to find our monthly credit scores for the past six months, during which time the score has decreased by a bit each month. I recognize that the message we received was almost assuredly the result of an automated system. But would it be so difficult to write code to take into account that there are actually people out there who are blessed to have paid off their mortgages and do not need to stretch out their credit card payments? Believe me, for many years Barry and I were literally barely making it through each month. Now that we are reasonably comfortable, I would like to think they would come and congratulate us for all those years of hard work at our educations and careers and our ability to take care of ourselves.

This reminded me of an old recurrent Saturday Night Live sketch featuring Steve Martin, Theodoric of York. I was able to find a video of “Theodoric of York, Medieval Barber.”

But the skit that comes to mind here is “Theodoric of York, Medieval Judge.” After ridiculous sentences for accused criminals, Mr. Martin turns to the camera and wonders aloud whether, in the future, men will be judged by a jury of their peers, but after speaking gloriously of this system, like the end of the barber skit, says “Nah!”

That congratulatory call from the folks who bring us our credit scores is just about as likely!

Love,

Rebecca

Defending Your Life

Although we really did miss being with our daughters and their families for the holiday, we did have a nice time at home in Riverdale. The services for the High Holidays are led by Dr. Elli Kranzler, who, in addition to being a child and adolescent psychiatrist, is an accomplished singer/composer who regularly leads prayer services at the Hebrew Institute of Riverdale. The fall holidays are a highlight of the year. This video is from last year’s annual pre-Selichot (special prayers recited prior to Rosh Hashana) concert. Unfortunately, we are no longer able to attend this (among other reasons, it is held very late at night), but it is still terrific to be able to share it from the comfort of my home office.

We were invited to join friends for lunch on both days, so there was an abundance of delicious food and enjoyable conversation. Although I am the only vegetarian in the group, both hosts prepared sumptuous dairy meals which everyone else clearly enjoyed as well.

On the second day, after catching up on everyone’s children and grandchildren (and, in one case, recent marriage), part of the conversation related to the meaning and significance of the holidays. That got me to thinking about the 1991 movie written, directed by, and starring Albert Brooks, “Defending Your Life.” If you have never seen it you really should.

In the movie, Brooks plays Daniel Miller, a young advertising executive whose distracted driving results in a fatal accident. In the afterlife he learns that he must defend his actions on earth in order to ascend to a higher place of existence. While undergoing his “trial” (hence the title), he meets and falls in love with Julia (played by Meryl Streep). Julia is probably about as perfect as a human being can be, and her own “defense” is simply inspiring, with incident after incident of her life full of courageous good deeds. Not surprisingly, the “judges” overwhelmingly deem Julia ready to move on to the next (presumably much better) world, while Daniel is to be sent back for another crack at life on earth. But this is a very upbeat movie, and I don’t think it will spoil too much to say that, in the eleventh hour, Daniel has an opportunity to prove himself worthy and the judges overturn their decision. The movie ends with the two of them riding off into the sunset towards a wonderful next phase of life.

Jewish tradition tells us that during this season we are judged for our deeds over the past year. All those hours of prayer are to focus ourselves on improvement. We repeat many times over Yom Kippur a list of sins we have committed.

אָשַֽׁמְנוּ	We have become guilty
בָּגַֽדְנוּ	We have strayed
גָּזַֽלְנוּ	We have robbed
דִּבַּֽרְנוּ דֹּֽפִי	We have spoken slander
הֶעֱוִֽינוּ	We have caused perversion
וְהִרְשַֽׁעְנוּ	We have caused wickedness
זַֽדְנוּ	We have sinned willfully
חָמַֽסְנוּ	We have extorted
טָפַֽלְנוּ שֶֽׁקֶר	We have accused falsely
יָעַֽצְנוּ רָע	We have given evil counsel
כִּזַּֽבְנוּ	We have been deceitful
לַֽצְנוּ	We have scorned
מָרַֽדְנוּ	We have rebelled
נִאַֽצְנוּ	We have provoked
סָרַֽרְנוּ	We have turned away
עָוִֽינוּ	We have been perverse
פָּשַֽׁעְנוּ	We have acted wantonly
צָרַֽרְנוּ	We have persecuted
קִשִּֽׁינוּ עֹֽרֶף	We have been obstinate
רָשַֽׁעְנוּ	We have been wicked
שִׁחַֽתְנוּ	We have corrupted
תִּעַֽבְנוּ	We have been abominable
תָּעִֽינוּ	We have strayed
תִּעְתָּֽעְנוּ	You have let us go astray

This is not to say that all of us or even any of us have done all of these things, but if we are honest with ourselves, it does not take long to check off a lot of those boxes. It is certainly overwhelming!

A few years ago, Rabbi Binyamin Holtzman, of Kibbutz Ma’ale Gilboa, composed a complementary confession that was adapted by Rabbi Avi Weiss (Hebrew Institute of Riverdale) that we might consider a more positive list of things we have done over the past year and things we hope to continue to do in the coming year:

אָהַבְנוּ, בֵּרַכְנוּ, גָּדַלְנוּ, דִִִּבַּרְנוּ  יֹפִי
We have loved, we have blessed, we have grown, we have spoken positively.

הֶעֱלִינוּ, וְחַסְנוּ, זֵרַזְנוּ
We have raised up, we have shown compassion, we have acted enthusiastically,

חָמַלְנוּ, טִפַּחְנוּ אֱמֶת
We have been empathetic, we have cultivated truth,

יָעַצְנוּ טוֹב, כִּבַּדְנוּ, לָמַדְנוּ, מָחַלְנוּ
We have given good advice, we have respected, we have learned, we have forgiven,

נִחַמְנוּ, סָלַלְנוּ, עוֹרַרְנוּ
We have comforted, we have been creative, we have stirred,

פָּעַלְנוּ, צָדַקְנוּ, קִוִּינוּ לָאָרֶץ
We have been spiritual activists, we have been just, we have longed for Israel,

רִחַמְנוּ, שָקַדְנוּ
We have been merciful, we have given full effort,

תָּמַכְנוּ, תָּרַמְנוּ, תִּקַּנּוּ
We have supported, we have contributed, we have repaired.

I want to give a shout out to Rabbi Noah Cheses of Sharon who reminded us of these wonderful thoughts our own rabbi had penned.

Now I just need a couple of days of rest from all that wonderful food and company!

Love,

Rebecca