Laura Kelly Fanucci, a 43-year-old writer, received shocking news on Easter Monday of 2023: She had invasive ductal carcinoma in her right breast. The stage wasn’t clear, but it was triple-negative, a particularly aggressive and rare form of breast cancer. She and her husband, Franco, told their five sons, now ages 4 to 14, all members of St. Joseph the Worker in Maple Grove. One year later — after multiple rounds of chemotherapy, immunotherapy and surgeries — she is cancer-free.
Q) You’ve already been through a lot of suffering, including the loss of your twin daughters right after their birth. Was it hard not to feel sorry for yourself with this cancer diagnosis?
A) It can be a temptation to dwell in feeling like, “God, this is too much. This is unfair.”
There’s so much suffering. It touches all our lives. Mine has been intense. But I also think there are ways in which my life is so abundantly blessed. There’s so much suffering I haven’t known.
We’re never going to get some kind of equation that we can solve. But having cancer has taught me so much about God’s own nature. There are things we come to know of God through suffering that can help us bear what feels unbearable.
Q) It seems like cancer gave you new eyes.
A) The veil does get lifted in little ways. I look around and think, “Every person is walking through it in different ways.” If someone is driving like a jerk, I think, “I don’t know their story. They might be racing to get to the hospital because their mom is dying.”
Any time you try to use your own suffering as a lens to realize everyone is suffering, it helps see the humanity in people who we want to dehumanize.
Q) What makes you such a good writer?
A) I took to heart this advice Ira Glass gave years ago. He said that when you start creating things, you’re always going to see a gap between what you’re able to do and what you want to be able to do. What you have to do is a huge volume of work. Learning to write on the internet, I could do a couple blog posts a week and get that regular practice.
It’s fun to try on other people’s styles. I adore Brian Doyle. I read a lot of fiction. It’s wonderful to read outside your genre.
Q) And you’ve taken up poetry, which can feel like a daunting leap for non-fiction writers.
A) I’ve always loved poetry, and I didn’t think I could write it at all. But an unexpected side effect of cutting my chops as a writer on the internet is that it can be very playful and inventive. I don’t care if I’m just experimental with it. Blogging was great for that. It was like: Write a little thing and put it out there. It made me braver to just share something.
I wrote this little poem that went viral during the pandemic. I didn’t even think it was a poem. It was more “here are some thoughts I had.” The fact that it took off made me realize people are hungry for a format that’s bite-sized because the world is overwhelming.
Sometimes I think, “Oh my goodness, I have no training in poetry.” But who cares? I can just play with it. It’s just using language in a new way. It’s made me more attuned to how deeply religious it is. This is a deeply human form of communication. It’s like music; it’s like songs. We all get to access that!
Q) You’ve put out poetry prompts on Instagram and received many responses.
A) When you invite someone to share even a sliver of their story, it comes rushing out of them. And the prompt feels like a low bar — just make a list of thoughts or feelings from this season in your life and put them together in a fresh or new way. You don’t have to be worried about the rhyme or format.
There’s something about storytelling that’s deeply spiritual, that makes us who we are as humans. When you invite a person into that, there is a soul-hunger. It’s like a call-and-response. It’s an affirmation of the human person. You are good and worthy, and you have this ability to create.
Q) You must receive great feedback on the writing you share online.
A) I always laugh — the posts I craft where I think, “Oh, this is pretty good and cool,” it’s like crickets. Just my family responds. And the ones I almost don’t publish, sure that people will think it’s crazy, that’s when they say: “Oh my gosh! You don’t know how much I needed to hear that.”
OK, I wrote that for you then — I just had to get out of the way. I’m just trying to be a channel. If I can just clear out my own junk, my own insecurities, and see how God can use me.
Q) I’ve noticed you’re very funny.
A) I come from an Irish Catholic family, so there is some dark humor. We knew that’s the way we’re going to get through life: We’re going to laugh at hard things. A sense of humor was always highly valued.
But it has been strengthened as a coping mechanism. I’ve said to my husband: “I think I’ve gotten funnier since I got cancer.” And I think some of it has been a conscious decision; there is only so much a person can cry. You have to get these emotions out of your body. Weeping is one way and laughing is another. It does feel good to release in that way. It’s such a delightful bridge between humans. It’s been a really lovely companion to keep myself afloat this year and also connect with others.
Over the years, I have come to see that there’s actually very deep holiness in humor. I love that humor and humility share the same root. To have a good sense of humor, you have to be a humble person, be willing to laugh at yourself or admit when you’ve got it wrong.
Q) In the wake of your diagnosis, what was most helpful when people reached out? What wasn’t helpful?
A) Everybody had a book or a diet or an herb or an essential oil. I do think that’s unhelpful. You’re overwhelmed with advice. They are very well-meaning, but you have to trust that people are seeking the best medical advice that works for them.
What helps the most is when people make concrete offers. When we say, “Just let me know what you need,” we think it’s helpful because it’s carte blanche. But the person who needs the help can barely tie their shoes in the morning and they cannot think about what they need and even if they can, it’s hard to say, “It would really help if you could pick up my kids every day this week.” But if the person says, “I’m already going to the grocery store, can I pick up a bag for you and drop it on your front porch and you don’t have to come out?”
In grief, you need those basics taken care of: groceries and meals and gas cards and watching the kids. One of my best friends set up a GoFundMe for me. That was so humbling and hard to accept at first. I thought, “No, we have health insurance and some people don’t.” But she was insistent: You’re not going to be able to work. You’re going to need help. And truly, that GoFundMe got us through the year. Even though people often want to do something physical — I got a lot of blankets and knit chemo caps — money can be so helpful for any family through something hard because there are always additional expenses. That gift of money let us do what we needed with it. I remember one day I got to take my kids out to lunch and pay for it like normal. We have five kids; I don’t usually take them out. But I thought: What a gift! This person let me be a fun mom today!
Q) Did you feel like you should keep a ledger to properly thank everyone or repay them somehow?
A) I’m still not over it. I feel overwhelmed with gratitude and some old-fashioned guilt. I didn’t send a single thank-you note — and my mom lovingly drilled that into my head as a kid. But I was overwhelmed with the basics of my life and my own treatment. I had no time for that. I finally heard from people who said, “Please give yourself the gift of just releasing from that.” I had to laugh at my therapist, who is a Catholic mom. She said, “Anyone who gave you something expecting a thank-you note — you need to give them my number!”
There are times in life when you don’t get to reciprocate. I was so overwhelmed with this at the washing of the feet on Holy Thursday. This woman I didn’t know was washing my feet. I started crying. I thought: This whole parish — and so many people in my life — have been washing my feet all year. Sometimes it’s really hard to learn how to receive. We just have to let them love us.
Q) How are you a different person now, having had this brush with mortality?
A) I think there is a sense that, even more so now, I try to live into the sacrament of the present moment. This is where God is fully present to us. On Easter morning, I was taking pictures of all my kids. I thought: “You’re so alive! I’m so alive! We’re here!” I was blasting the Alleluia chorus (“Hallelujah Chorus” from “Messiah” by George Frideric Handel).
I feel like I know a secret that a lot of people don’t learn till much later in their life, which is not to waste your time worrying about success or fame or what other people think. When you truly see what life is about, it does relax you.
Q) What do you know for sure?
A) I know for sure that there is a God who is love and goodness. I know for sure that the resurrection is real. And even through losing our daughters, even through having cancer, I’m seeing how our own lives bring us that pattern of dying and rising.
There are so many uncertainties I wrestle with, but at the end the day, those are really big things that I know for sure. Holding close to that handful of truths has totally changed my way of being in the world.
And I always know that God is going to surprise me!
Laura Kelly Fanucci‘s column, Faith at Home may be found here.
