Priscilla Mack was in the shower on a sultry Wednesday in August when she felt a tiny lump in her left breast.
Her husband, U.S. Sen. Connie Mack (R-Fla.), was rafting down the Colorado River with no clue his wife was about to become the fifth member of their immediate family to be stricken with cancer.
It was not until he returned to Washington four days later that Priscilla Mack could drop her bombshell.
”When she told me about the lump, I thought, `Oh, my God, I am going to lose her,”` Mack said quietly over lunch in a Capitol Hill restaurant recently. ”I know that sounds like it`s out of the movies, but we have lived together for 31 years. We have a friendship that is beyond marriage.”
For Mack, whose real name is Cornelius McGillicuddy III and who is the namesake and grandson of baseball`s legendary Philadelphia Athletics owner, the terror was understandable.
Twelve years earlier, he spent a month at an Atlanta hospital watching his younger brother, Michael McGillicuddy, die of a malignant melanoma at age 35.
His mother, too, had breast cancer a dozen years ago. She is still alive, as is his daughter, who had cervical cancer. Their other child, Connie Mack IV, remains healthy.
Mack blames the Florida sun and the brothers` fair ”Irish coloring” for Michael`s tumor and his own malignant mole that was removed from his side in 1989.
But none of that family history prepared him for his wife`s discovery. She had, after all, gotten a mammogram last November and a full gynecological exam in June.
By mid-September, after biopsy surgery but before all results were in, Priscilla Mack`s doctor virtually confirmed that the pea-sized tumor was malignant.
”The first thing, my heart sank. It was your worst fears come true,”
she recalled.
The Macks-high school sweethearts who had their first date 35 years ago when she was 14 and he was 16-began interrogating doctors to learn all they could about her condition. Together.
”When Connie was diagnosed with melanoma, I thought, `I`ve lost him.`
When it is you, you think, `This isn`t good, but I will see where it will take me,` ” she said.
”I didn`t think I would die because the type of cancer I had indicated that the prognosis would be good. But when they told me I had to have chemotherapy and radiation, I thought, `It`s not good.”`
She later learned that post-operative treatment does not necessarily equal a grim prognosis, and she will not need radiation therapy.
A modified mastectomy and reconstructive surgery were set for Oct. 3, giving the couple time to attend two important events:
– The remarriage of their daughter, Debra Caldwell, who last year was treated for cervical cancer.
– A hearing of the House Health and Environment subcommittee, where Priscilla Mack-heretofore a stay-in-the-background, stand-by-your-man political wife-delivered the first major public speech of her life.
It lasted a scant two minutes and contained only one message. Early detection, through monthly breast self-examination and regular mammograms, saves lives.
She gave newspaper and radio interviews, almost unheard-of conduct for the woman who, at her husband`s campaign kickoff speech for Congress in 1982, thought she would ”throw up in fright” if reporters came near her.
Her most pressing missions accomplished, ”Pris” Mack entered Georgetown University Medical Center in Washington. It took doctors four hours to remove her left breast and 14 lymph nodes and begin rebuilding what remained, using the skin above and below the incision and a temporary, tissue-expanding implant.
She knew what to expect. Before the operation the couple had watched videos of all the procedures ”so you don`t have to wake up from surgery and be shocked at what you look like.”
Three days later she was home and three days after that, she got all gussied up to attend a surprise birthday party for Sen. Trent Lott of Mississippi.
She stayed only 10 minutes, but ”I needed to say, `I am out and about and feeling good about it.` I was a little sore, but that`s OK.”
Now, nearly eight weeks after surgery and six weeks into chemotherapy, Priscilla and Connie Mack are talking about cancer with a vengeance.
And bantering.
And finishing each other`s sentences.
And tactfully correcting one another.
And thoroughly enjoying themselves.
”I feel I have a little bit of a basketball stuffed in my left side,”
she said. ”After the chemotherapy ends and the tissue is expanded to match the other side, they will put in a permanent implant.” That will probably take place in six months.
Priscilla Mack knows that breast implants are controversial, that some women have been seriously injured or disfigured by those that harden or rupture and release silicone gel throughout the body.
But Mack-a no-nonsense woman with a frame so slim her friends jokingly volunteered their own thigh, tush and tummy flab to build up her breast-knew all about the risks.
She and her husband asked countless questions, grilled their doctors and then made the decision to go ahead with the implant.
”It has meant a lot to me to know there was something I could do if I chose to. It means I will be able to wear the same clothes without an artificial prosthesis. I will be whole and healthy and able to feel good,”
she said.
Connie Mack interjected: ”You can imagine movies where the wife gets a mastectomy and the husband won`t look.”
”That really happens, sweetie,” she said gently.
But not, apparently, to them.
”As soon as I got home and could take the bandage off, I did, so we both could see it. Your intimate relationship is very involved with your body parts, and being able to share it is just another way of loving and understanding,” she said.
She had high praise for national and local cancer society programs that send mastectomy survivors to talk with patients, offer counseling and information on support groups and conduct classes on makeup, wigs and turbans. She considers the cosmetic tips particularly important for women who lose their hair during chemotherapy and radiation. She has not yet lost hers, but the cosmetologist who cuts her husband`s hair intends to ”get a wig to play with,” just in case.
She smiled at the senator`s surprise that she had changed her makeup to accent her blue eyes and ”hide the crevices.”
”You kept telling me how good I look,” she said, ”and now you know why.”
Recently, Mack made her second appearance before a government panel, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration`s advisory board on plastic surgery devices. The subject was breast implants. The panel has concluded that several companies have failed to prove scientifically that their implant products are safe. The panel`s recommendations are not binding, but often are followed by the FDA, which also may use the findings to determine whether the products can remain on the market while safety studies continue.
Mack`s two-minute speech stressed how important it was to her to have reconstructive surgery and how important it is for other women to have that same choice.
Since discovering her own tumor, Mack has become almost missionary on the subject of early detection.
Mack does not view her experience with cancer as a path to elective office, which is what her husband did. In 1982, inspired by his late brother, political neophyte Connie Mack of Cape Coral won the first of three U.S. House races.
”The thing I learned through Michael`s death . . . was that helping other people was the most satisfying activity that I could be involved in,”
Mack told the Palm Beach Post last year.
In 1988 he was elected to the Senate, where he and Sen. John Breaux (D-La.) have introduced legislation to provide tax credits and deductions for cancer screening.
Don`t expect Priscilla Mack to follow her husband`s lead.
`I didn`t run for the Senate or the House. We have one politician in the family and that is plenty. I have always been his wife. That`s all I care about. Politics is fine, but I am not going to be out front. I`ve got plenty to do keeping him happy, me happy, our children happy.”
