On October 16, Dr. Jerri Nielsen, author of Ice Bound, A Doctor’s Struggle for Survival at the South Pole, came to campus and shared her South Pole adventure—discovering, diagnosing, and treating her own aggressive form of breast cancer—with the Scripps community.
With candor, ease, and a whole lot of humor, she painted a vivid portrait of “life at the Pole,” from the refrigerator units used as sleeping compartments [to keep cold out, not in], to the three-day thawing needed for any and all food [except the pork, which took almost 21 days], to the primitive and non-stalled co-ed restrooms [difficult, but you get used to it]. Nielsen’s portrayal of life on the icy frontier was as expected—a curious and difficult scenario to imagine.
Now, add breast cancer in that mix. Obviously not one to dwell on the negative, Nielsen did not inform her Pole colleagues until three months later when she felt her illness warranted immediate medical attention. Quickly teaching the team’s welder to act as a rudimentary surgeon’s assistant, Nielsen performed a biopsy on herself, using only ice and a topical solution to numb her skin to the initial incision.
“Oh, it hurt like hell,” she wryly acknowledged to the gasping audience.
More astonishing than this revelation, however, is the claim Nielsen makes about her illness. “I was lucky to have cancer, because cancer gave my life color and texture. Horrible things happen worse than illness, than death. Things you cannot control. And the trick is to remember that, in the end, it’s not how or when you die, it’s being able to answer the question: ‘Did you ever really live?'”
Nielsen goes on to explain: “Every one of us can change our lives multiple times. To change your life you simply have to change your mind. Let go of the life you had before. Find the peace that comes with acceptance of things you cannot control because it’s in that peace that you gain clarity of thought and can make new life choices from this point forward. This life I have now, after the Pole, after cancer, is my second life. It’s my ‘gift’ life.”
In her closing remarks, Nielsen summarized her experiences and attitude with words from Goethe, words she asserts are now the motto of this “gift life.”
“If there is anything you can do, or dream you can, begin it.”
So, taking Nielsen’s [and Goethe’s] lessons to heart, the Scripps community was encouraged that here, in each person’s heart and mind, there can “begin new life.”
Truly, a fitting message for this Founder’s Day event.