desk when a nurse practitioner called her cellphone with the biopsy results: She had invasive lobular cancer. Amy tried to write down the diagnosis on the back of an envelope. The words went into my ears, but they just werent registering, she recalled. How do you spell that? she kept asking. She hung up and burst into tears. Its not fair, she said to her office mate, who was trying to console her. Were good people. It was supposed to be benign.

In those early weeks of the coronavirus, hospitals were just putting in place social distancing rules to protect patients from infection. Family members were prohibited or sharply limited from joining cancer patients as they go from diagnosis to surgery, from chemotherapy to recovery.

Suddenly, the Sapiens could noreplaced his grueling chemo infusions with an oral drug. Some days, his second grade teacher drops by, and they shout to each other through a closed window.

Earlier this month, she got the news that she wont need chemotherapy, but will be on hormone suppression treatments for at least the next decade, and will go into rapid menopause. It is highly likely that she will need a hysterectomy.

Still, she tries to focus on what she can control. She oversees Landens home schooling, which he does by Zoom with his teacher. She watches the boys as they make up imaginary games with their Duplos, and swim in the backyard pool when Landen is well enough. The family just got a new puppy, a brown Bernedoodle named River. The Sapiens had