The one and only time I met Walter Cronkite I was in such awe I don't think I ever stopped gawking. I tried to act like a professional around him -- but couldn't. His reputation was just too big, his celebrity too well deserved.

It was the summer of...

Five months ago, I left my home in New York and made a pilgrimage to a nursing home on top of a remote hill in West Virginia to visit an extraordinary yet frail and ailing woman. She was easy to find - but no other journalist had tried in more...

I am no longer a surgical patient.

Just three weeks after my hysterectomy and surgery to remove my ovaries, my doctor has cleared me to take back my life. He said I am healing perfectly and I can even resume exercising. I don't have to go back to his office...

Today is two weeks since my surgery and I basically feel as if I never had an operation. The best news I can report is that I haven't had a single hot flash. Not one. So far, surgical menopause is just something I was anticipating and fearing - but haven't...

I am "grossly unremarkable."

Those are the best words I could have heard yesterday when I went to see my doctor for the first time following my operation a week ago today. He didn't actually say it about me -- he was showing them to me typed out on a...

An enormous wave of relief flew through my body Thursday afternoon when I woke up from surgery. I was barely awake in the recovery room - still on morphine - and all at once I realized that I had not only made it through the operation (I was alive!) but...

Howdy - My name is Mark - and I'm Allison's husband. As I write this, Allison is in her hospital bed right beside me. It's 7pm in New York.

The surgery went very well -- as well as we could have hoped. With this type of surgery, the going-in plan...

Preparing for surgery these last few days has been like getting ready to go into labor. I've been nesting. My house is tidy and the fridge is full. I've also gotten a haircut, my nails done, and even indulged in a massage. The cleaning was going to continue this morning...

There's an open box of tampons sitting on my bathroom counter and I can't get myself to put them away. Every time I pee or put on make-up, there they are, staring at me. The little blue carton has taken on illogical meaning these last few days - like the...

I have a lot to be thankful for this Thanksgiving. My husband. My kids. My family. But as I prepare to get my ovaries removed and undergo a hysterectomy in exactly one week from today -- it is my mother, who died 11 years ago, whom I am thankful for...

I just got off the phone with my doctor's office and I have been officially cleared for surgery. The results of the pre-op blood work I did last week came back all fine.

And, in honor of Thanksgiving, I thought you'd love to read the menu I was given...

This week I met with my doctor for the last time before my surgery. I showed up with my husband and a very clear agenda of what I wanted to discuss. I needed to figure out -- once and for all -- what we were going to do about my...

My aunt called me the other day from Oregon and crushed me with some unexpected news. She told me she was canceling her plans to come to New York for my surgery.

I reassured her that I'd be fine and that I understood. And I do, intellectually. But it's...

Big decision. I've decided to change hospitals and surgeons for my upcoming surgery. I know it's last minute, but I had to do it.

The doctor I was going to have the surgery with at New York-Presbyterian had been my mother's surgeon 14 years ago when she was diagnosed...

Most women go into menopause, gradually, in their 40s. I'm in a different category. When I get my ovaries removed and undergo a hysterectomy in just a few weeks, I'll wake-up from the operation 37-years-old and I'll immediately be in menopause.

It's called surgical menopause, and I'm told, it'll...

I am now on my last pack of birth control pills. With my surgery now less than a month away, I knew there would be a "last," but I wasn't prepared -- at all -- for how it would make me feel to open that final, little package.

My...

As soon as I found out I tested positive for BRCA1, I knew I had some serious decisions to make. I ultimately determined, after many years of conversation and research, to have my ovaries removed and to undergo a hysterectomy. Today's Blog is devoted to the best resources I've found...

Once I made the decision to have surgery because of my BRCA1 diagnosis, the next challenge was figuring which procedure to have. At the very least, my doctors urged, I should remove my ovaries. That much was clear. It would reduce my chances of getting ovarian cancer by at least...

My public journey into surgery was inspired by a courageous young woman I've never met. I read about her, like so many of us did, in the New York Times.

Deborah Lindner tested positive, like I have, for BRCA1, and decided to undergo a mastectomy to head off...

Why now?

Since I started writing about my journey into surgery, people have been asking me why I chose to do the surgery now. It's a great question, of course, because it's a decision I didn't arrive at quickly or without a great deal of research; I've been grappling...