BIRTHDAY GIRL

“I never was really much of a birthday person, but I am now,” says Lake Bluff ’s Erin Henkel, a married mom of two young girls. “Yesterday was my birthday and you better believe I took every call, relished in every text message, and enjoyed all the cake. Birthdays just hit differently now.”

In addition to celebrating her birthday this year, Henkel also marked her 10th anniversary being cancer free. When her youngest daughter was just a newborn, Henkel was diagnosed with an advanced Stage 3 breast cancer.

“I had no trouble nursing my older daughter Eloise,” recalls Henkel. “So, when my younger daughter Milly stopped nursing on one side, I knew something wasn’t right.”

Henkel’s intuition led her right into her doctor’s office where she was initially misdiagnosed with mastitis.

“I know the doctors had to run through their checklist of what could be causing this,” she says. “I had just been pregnant and was now nursing so you don’t naturally jump from that to something like cancer. So, they sent me home with a prescription for an antibiotic.”

After a week of nothing changing, Henkel was brought back for a mammogram and an ultrasound, something she had never done because she was only 34 at the time. Her worst fears were confirmed.

“The radiologist delivered the news in a very-matter-of-fact way. It was cancer. I needed double mastectomy, chemotherapy, and radiation. It was a lot to hear all at once,” she remembers. “The tumor itself was very big and had spread to my lymph nodes. All of the doctors suspected I was stage 4 because they saw a spot on my sternum that they thought was cancer. While I knew the cancer was in my lymph nodes, I refused to believe it had spread to my sternum. I had this mantra I would say at night leading up to my scans, ‘my bones are healthy, my bones are strong.’ I thought I could will this to be true.”

It was the first break Henkel received throughout the diagnosis process— the cancer had not spread to her bones. But because of her age and the size of her tumor, they decided to treat her cancer as if it had.

“I realized quickly how important my mental state was to everything,” she says. “I would literally envision my appointments with my doctor, from her saying ‘hello’ to me to the medicine working its way through my body. I would actually picture the medicine going through my cells doing what it’s supposed to do.”

Having come out on the other side of a scary diagnosis and treatment regimen, Henkel offers her experience as a resource for others.

“I never want to push my story on other people, but if they ask for my help, I’m here to give it,” she says. “I’m a big believer in patients asking their doctors for medicine when they need it. There were times I would try to sleep, and I just couldn’t turn off my brain. Sometimes it felt like torture. But the doctor gave me something I could take right before bedtime, just a little bit, and it would just quiet everything for me so I could sleep. Rest is so important.”

Although Henkel is a huge advocate of the science that healed her, she’s equally supportive of the notion that we need to fuel our bodies properly to be healthy.

“I would make myself drink 100 ounces of water a day,” she remembers. “I made it a game so that I was sure to drink all of that water every day. I know that’s how I was able to flush the toxins out of my body. I also tell everyone going through this to buy the book, The Cancer-Fighting Kitchen by Rebecca Katz and Mat Edelson. This book taught me what I could put in my body to make myself better. I have made batches and batches of their Miracle Broth. There’s like 15 different ingredients in it. My mom and I had to go to at least three different grocery stores to find everything. We would boil it all together, strain it, and be left with this broth. I would sip on this during my treatments, and I would just feel better knowing that I was doing everything I could to heal my body.”

Henkel credits her husband Andrew, her family, and friends for rallying around her, filling in for her when she couldn’t be there, and giving her the strength to become a cancer survivor. While initially Henkel was very involved with fundraising efforts around breast cancer awareness, she’s now channeling her energies to raising her beautiful girls who are at Lake Bluff Middle School and Junior High, working on various commissions she receives as an artist, and coordinating events for Lake Forest Book Store—a role that fuels her passion for reading.

“I don’t for one minute lose sight of the fact that things could have turned out very differently for me,” Henkel says. “This just makes me more grateful and more determined to live each day to the fullest.”

To see a portfolio of Henkel’s artwork, visit erinhenkel.com or on Instagram @erinhenkelpaintings.