I’ve been pretty quiet on social media for some time now, and I’ve so much news to tell!!
First off, I’m alive and well. And three years ago I wasn’t sure I’d make it to see 2016. But after two rounds of chemotherapy and radiation, I’m cancer-free now for just over two years! That’s two more years of life than I thought I was going to have. So, huge thank you’s to the thousands of people who contributed to my healthcare crowdsourcing campaign, back in 2012.
In gratitude, I’ve aimed to make this extra alive-time of mine count by focusing on 1) fun things to do that 2) help put an end to suffering for all sentient beings. Here’s what I've got cooking:
A brand-new edition of my first book, Gender Outlaw
I'm so glad to be out on the road again with some old favorite performances and workshops, as well as some brand new material. I'll be blogging soon about what exactly I'm up to—but here are some dates for now. I hope I get to see you at one of these gigs—if so, please do say hello! xoxo Auntie Kate
JANUARY APPEARANCES:
January 10 Sunday matinee New York City: MDLSX, By Motus, Performed by Silvia Calderoni. I’m speaking on a talkback panel after the performance http://lamama.org/mdlsx/
January 15 Friday evening, New York City: SQUIRTS at La MaMa. I’m onstage with Miz June and PWR BTTM, one time only! http://lamama.org/squirts-2016/
February 26 Friday evening, London, Wheatsheaf Hall, a LoveSpirit event with Barbara Carrellas and me: "Our Journeys in Sex, Gender and Spirit.” Tickets and details: click here.
————————–
MARCH, APRIL, MAY and JUNE BOOKINGS ARE IN THE WORKS
Hello Dear Friends, Family, Allies, and Simply Curious,
I'm happy to say that my cancer has been in remission for nearly a year and a half. My strength and stamina continue to improve—and that means I'm ready to hit the road again this fall. Given all that's been happening in the wild and wacky world of trans over the last year or so, it's clear that a new version of Trans 101 is sorely needed. To that end, I've put together a new workshop and I'm taking it on the road:
Transgender Is Here to Stay—So Now What Do You Do?!
On May 29, 2014, Laverne Cox graced the cover of Time Magazine, along with the words, “Transgender Tipping Point, America’s Next Civil Rights Frontier.” Ever since then, there’s been more and more evidence that proves Time’s point. Transgender is irrevocably out of the closet, and smack dab center stage in the culture. Some common questions that all of us are having to ask include:
Is gender a binary, a spectrum, or what?
What’s the difference between transgender and trans?
Other than gender, can you name ten factors that define your sexuality?
What are three can’t-fail ways to be an ally in Trans civil rights? (Hint: it’s not pronouns or bathrooms)
What words for trans must you never use? (Hint: there aren’t any—it just depends on who you're using them with)
Can you articulate a definitive truth of gender that everyone can agree on?
I’ve designed this lecture/workshop to provide the tools most folks might need to mindfully articulate, discuss, have fun with, and navigate on their own terms, the world beyond a transgender tipping point.
Now Booking My 2015-2016 Speaking & Performance Tours
I’m looking forward to presenting this workshop in your town, at your high school, on your campus, or at your conference. Here's a shiny new touring catalogue that lays out pretty much everything I'm doing on tour these days: Download KateBornstein_15-16_Tour_Catalogue
Booking & interview inquiries, please email me at katebornstein at earthlink dot net. To get in touch with me personally, the best way is still Twitter or Instagram @katebornstein.
Hiya. I'm SO PLEASED that I'm well enough for another round of tours. Winter is almost fully booked, and my agent and I are still working on spring. If you see that I've got a free day in or around your area, and you'd like to book me for a performance, lecture, or workshop, please contact Jean Caiani through her website at SpeakOut.
I'll update this page from time to time with new gigs, confirmations on dates currently being held, and/or specifics as I receive them. Please do let me know if you'd like to explore bringing me to see you in April or May. xoxo Auntie
Sunday, Mar 22: Pittsburgh, PA, Carnegie Melon University. I keynote the 2015 MOSAIC Conference on Gender, with the theme "Deconstructing Gender: Beyond the Binary."
Wednesday, Mar 25: North Adams, MA, Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts
Friday, Apr 10: Palo Alto, HOLDING THIS DATE FOR CA, Stanford University
Saturday, Sunday, Apr 11-12: San Jose, CA. Barbara Carrellas and I are attendingIMsL 2015. Plans are in the works for an onstage interview with one or both of us. Admission for paid attendees only.
Tuesday, April 28: New York City, Bluestocking Books, I'm reading at the New York City launch of Changers Book 2, By: T Cooper and Allison Glock-Cooper. I love these books. Look at how much time you have to read (or reread) Book 1!
Thursday, May 21, London, UK: Hackney Attic, Me, Onstage in Conversation with my long time friend and colleague, Roz Kaveny.
I’m delighted to write that my lung cancer continues to be officially in remission. What's more, my leukemia has dropped back down to Stage 0. So, here I go… heading back out on the road for a fall touring season. It’s been nearly two years since I was last out and about on a series of tours, performing, giving talks, facilitating workshops, and meeting with students and faculty.
Now, I’m still recovering from those years of surgeries, chemotherapy, and radiation therapy, so my doctors, girlfriend, and touring agent have all laid down the law as to what I can do and what I mustn’t do. Used to be I could do a classroom appearance, a lecture, a workshop or a performance, a book signing, and meals with students and faculty—all in one day! I’d love to be able to continue with that kind of pace, but I haven’t yet built up enough energy and strength. So, I’m limiting myself to two of those events a day. What’s more, it used to be that I could live on fast food and Diet Pepsi. Now, I eat fresh veggies and fish. No sugar, gluten, or dairy. Lots of water. My presenters for this round of touring are making sure I eat well, and they’ve all built down time into my schedule.
I’m betting on a long-lasting remission, and ever-increasing health, energy and stamina. With all that in mind, I’m currently booking my winter/spring tour schedule. If you want to bring me to your town, please drop me a line at katebornstein at earthlink dot net. Any correspondence sent to this address for any reason other than booking tours, will not be answered. Twitter is still the best way to reach me for any personal reason. I hope to be tweeting updates from the road, as well as posting photos to Instagram. My account name at both Twitter and Instagram is @katebornstein.
So, here I go! If you can, please catch up with me at one of the following stops.
October 20: New Orleans, LA. Tulane University October 22: Radnor, PA. Cabrini College, National Body Image Conference October 27: LaCrosse, WI. U Wisconsin LaCrosse October 28: Waukesha, WI. U Wisconsin Waukesha October 29: Madison, WI. U Wisconsin Madison October 30: Milwaukee, WI. U Wisconsin Milwaukee November 8: Chicago, IL. U Chicago, conference “Transgender In the Academy and In the Arts” November 20: Bristol, RI. Roger Williams College, Transgender Day of Remembrance
Today is Monday, 5 May 2014. As of today, you have raised $22,181.00 to help Kate #StayAlive! Our goal is $75,000. Thank you from the bottom of our hearts. xoxo
Hello friends and family,
This is Barbara, Kate Bornstein’s partner in life, love and art. I’m writing to ask—once again—for your help.
As many of you know, Kate’s lung cancer is back. It reappeared in late December in a lymph node behind her collarbone. The good news is that it did not travel far from it’s original site. Recent scans show it’s not in her brain or bones. The further good news is that it did not reappear anywhere that had been previously treated with radiation and chemotherapy. This means that the doctors can treat this new tumor aggressively and the treatment is likely to work. We have been assured that this cancer is still curable.
The bad news is that the treatment for this second round is way more intense than the last (and we thought that round was challenging!) This means that in addition to more intense chemo and radiation, she needs more supplements and alternative therapies to keep her fighting. She’s much weaker with this new treatment and needs to spend more on transportation to and from treatments. She has a hard time doing basic tasks, like preparing food for herself and the pets. Even getting dressed to go to chemo/radiation treatments is a challenge. Small tasks are not just physically, but also emotionally, overwhelming. This “brain fog” and the accompanying extreme energy drain are common, yet hideous side effects of the treatment. Worse yet, these effects will continue for months after treatment has stopped. This means we have no idea when she can return to work.
We are deeply grateful for your astoundingly generous donations of over $100,000 last year. It’s the support of her community—and we mean emotional, physical, and psychic support, as well as financial—that helps Kate #StayAlive. We still have a bit of that $100,000 left and we are stretching it as far as it can possibly go. (Let me take a moment to thank the people who are currently providing their services and products at reduced cost.) But Kate is going to run out of money very soon.
In short, if Kate is going to #StayAlive, she needs the financial support of her community once again. Kate wants me to be sure to tell you how hard it is to ask for this kind of support. She knows many of you have financial challenges of your own. Please give only if and what you can afford. All of the money raised goes directly towards Kate's treatment.
Whether or not you can donate, you can help Kate #StayAlive by letting others know how they can help. Please forward/post/distribute this message widely. For inquiries and/or offers of help, write to KateStayAlive(at) gmail (dot) com.
And just so you know, Kate is truly appreciative of all the supportive tweets and other messages she's been receiving. Please understand that although it’s hard for her to respond to all of them, they mean the world to her.
I began this blog on Sunday, Feb 16. I wrote that it was a bleak winter’s day in the city. You couldn’t really walk the sidewalks, you more or less had to shuffle along without lifting your feet. Storm after storm after storm here in the city, and most of us had given up trying to clear the stairs and sidewalks… or our salt ran out. The dogs were thoroughly delighted to be indoors and warm. They’re paper trained, but I wouldn’t give either of them an A+. The cats grudgingly adapted to the constant indoor doggie presence. The cats are raptors, see, with all their senses fine-tuned toward food that either B or I might have left out. To the cats, the dogs are a stinky, annoying distraction to the hunt. (We found that out through our animal communicator.) For Bruce the turtle, it might as well have been a blue-sky spring afternoon. Inside his terrarium, it nearly always is. And Barbara and I had a really sweet Sunday together, back when I began to write this blog. Well, I finished and posted it today, Wednesday, Feb 19. My next chemo treatment is tomoro. The chemo is causing me big time discomfort but no pain and I’m not throwing up. My brain comes and goes. I’m grateful that there’s no more to the side effects than that. (Knock wood!)
Two more weeks of treatments after tomoro's, THEN B & I go to Iceland to celebrate our birthdays (mine: March 15th & Barbara’s: March 16th). We found an awesome package last year when I first found out that chemo round one had worked, and the cancer was, for the time being, gone. Here’s our Iceland package: we’ve got five nights & 6 days hotel, a pass to the Blue Lagoon, a boat trip if the northern lights are shining, AND we've found a stable where we can go to ride short, stubby Icelandic horses!! (I think my knees are going to drag along the ground.) The day after we’re back, I begin 5 more weeks of weekly chemo and daily (weekdays) radiation. Then some more chemo for the fuck of it. Then I'm done. Or done for. Ha!!
I owe YOU my life. Truth. So, thanks. Huh. Just writing that makes me want to stay alive even more. Funny, how that works. I'm diving back into Buddhism. It was my first really deep mind/spirit puzzler, back in college and in the 60s. Koans blew me away, and Zen slapstick tickled my funny bone in a most delightful way. Now, I'm more into Tibetan Buddhism, and I'm boning up on wisdom and compassion. This, along with my dialectic behavioral therapy skills, is keeping me remarkably stable during this time. I’ll blog more when I can articulate what exactly it might be that I’m learning.
OK, here’s what’s not been a joy about this time: I’ve had to cancel my entire winter/spring touring season, over a dozen engagements that I was SO looking forward to. I’m sorry to disappoint—do know that I’m disappointed as well. I’m asking for rain checks from all the schools who wanted me to come speak or perform. Now… if you’re looking for an awesome speaker or act to bring to your campus or event, please consider contacting my booking agent, Jean Caiani at SpeakOut – the Institute for Democratic Education & Culture. These are way cool, leftie folks who make space for more radical leftie, loving voices. I really enjoy working with SpeakOut, and I know you will too.
Sad to say, I’ve also had to cancel out on International Ms. Leather, where I was slated to be both a judge and the keynote speaker. Most sincere regrets to the leather ladies of all genders. I was SO looking forward to being there with you at the reboot of such a wonderful BDSM gathering. I’m grateful and pleased that my replacement is none other than my pal & co-editor of Gender Outlaws: the next generation— the gallant, wise, well-spoken, and sexy S. Bear Bergman. Wishing him and you all a terrific time of it.
In closing—wow—I’ve finished this—it’s a beautiful, bright sunny winter’s day in the city, and that brings me to the very last thing I wanted to tell you: in what mode has your Auntie decided to face this round of treatment. Well, darling, I’m going for perky. Yes indeedy! Move over, Mary Tyler Moore. (Miss Holly Hughes says I’m more than Moore, and she wants to be my Lou Grant! Oh, purr.) Yep, perky me—that’s how I’m looking at these days of mine: with a smile on my face, a song in my heart, and a dance in every footstep.
I love you, and I’ll be in touch again sooner or later.
kiss kiss
Auntie Kate
PS: In the spirit of perkiness, here are some signals I’d like to boost.
Art Saves Lives
I’m a firm believer in the notion that art saves lives. To that end, I wanna support some artists who are dear to me:
1) Photographer, and queer arts impresario, SD Holman has kick-started a project called “Butch: Not like the other girls.” The title alone should tell you why it’s a no-brainer that I’m backing this project.I was supposed to contribute some writing to this piece, but then my cancer took over my life’s priorities. Do check it out and contribute if you can, cuz its a jaw-dropper, a real yum-dinger.
2) I know songwriter Steven Alvarado from Twitter. Recently, I put out a call for help in dealing with nameless fears. Steven tweeted me back saying, “Stand like Wonder Woman.” I tried it. It worked—I felt better! Now, Mr. Alvarado is in a pickle and needs help with his rent. If standing like Wonder Woman makes you feel better, please help Steven out with his rent.
Reading Books Saves Lives
I can’t read much when my brain’s all foggy, but here’s what’s on my reading cue just now. These are my spirit books. I’m reading and re-reading these books by His Holiness, The Dalai Lama:
1) Advice on Dying, and Living a Better Life 2) The Essence of the Heart Sutra 3) Practicing Wisdom
For my physical #stayalive regimens, I’m reading these:
1) all of Kris Carr’s books on Crazy, Sexy Cancer 2) Healing Spices, by Bharat B. Aggarwal, PhD, with Debora Yost 3) Life Over Cancer, by Keith Block & Andrew Weil MD
These are the fun books up on my cue, to read when I can’t write or just need to live inside someone else’s words besides my own:
1) The Rhapsody of Blood trilogy by Roz Kaveney 2) Redefining Realness, by Janet Mock 3) Changers, Book One, by T Cooper & Allison Glock-Cooper 4) The Reason I Jump, by Naoki Higashida & David Mitchell 5) The Sandman: Overture, by Neil Gaiman 6) Christian Science, by Mark Twain
My lung cancer is back—not in my lung, but in some lymph node. Here comes surgery, chemo, and radiation again. Now, kindly allow me to put this in a perspective and context that I promise is NOT scary. Really, I’m doing super well with this, and I’ve got a lot to tell you that I’m finding out, so please hang in here with me. Trust me, I’m The Auntie.
Right, history first: I was first diagnosed with lung cancer on September 24, 2012. I had surgery to remove the upper lobe of my right lung. The surgical team tried real hard, but they didn’t get it all. Normally, I would’ve gone straight on to chemo and radiation. But a big deal medical oncologist determined that there was no chemo that would work on me. If I wanted to live, he told me, it had to be by radiation alone. To be fair, the doctor was confronted by a challenge in me. I’ve got a whacky health status and, an immune system compromised by chronic lymphocytic leukemia that was first diagnosed in 1996. Plus, I’ve got a body grown on testosterone, that’s now running on estrogen. Genital conversion surgery aside, I’m minus a gall bladder, half a liver, and 12 inches of intestine. I’ve got cervical dystonia and scoliosis. I’m a rambling wreck! And, hello… I’m OLD! (Oh yes, I am. More on that later.) But y’know what the last straw was—the final thing about me that would bar me from all approved chemo regimens? Tinnitus. All my life, I’ve had a ringing in my ears. I didn’t learn until high school that I was the only one hearing all those mad bells and buzzers. I thought you heard them, too… all the time, like me. Well, tinnitus is a common side-effect of most chemo, and what it could do to me was make me deaf, and maybe even kill me. Like in Buffy or Haven, blood would leak out of my ears and I’d die, that’s what he implied anyway. Yes, honey, I do tend to exaggerate, but truly: it was the ringing in my ears when the big deal medical oncologist threw up his hands and, with a look of pity, handed me over to the radiologist.
My girlfriend and I did a lot a research—friends gave us terrific advice for alternative treatments. Through my touring work and book income, I’ve been able to pay for insurance that covered me fairly well for medicorp-government-approved procedures. But I had insufficient money to cover any forms of treatment outside the approved regimens—not to mention the cost of living while getting those treatments. That’s when my miracle happened. That’s when some friends came to my side. Thousands and thousands of friends and family came to my side. Maybe one was you—maybe you sent me money and/or you sent me love. One week of crowd-sourcing raised me over $100,000. Thousands of you. Thousands of people told me they love me. Can you imagine what a lasting blow that was to my low self-esteem?!
Well, the money raised covered it all. Thank you. Acting on the advice of Kris Carr, I found a clinic in Chicago where the doctors did their homework and found a chemo treatment that had just passed a stage two clinical trial. I began chemo on my birthday, March 15 2013, and I continued to travel to Chicago every three weeks through June. At the same time, I received 33 days of radiation, here in New York City. And it all worked. The cancer was gone, and it had been a year to the day since I was first diagnosed. Such relief and joy!! I had six amazing cancer-free months, during which I got back out on the road for some unforgettably wonderful engagements. What’s more, I’ve had the time and circumstances and good health to begin a novella—a book I’m writing just for the love of writing it. It’s delightful fiction that I’ve been wanting to write now for over a decade, but other books needed to come first. As of this past Christmas, I’d got through the first two chapters. Then, on December 30th, a PET CT revealed, and a fine-needle aspiration confirmed: yep, the lung cancer is back.
Darling, those were always the odds. That’s how cancer works. So now, I’m simply moving on with the next phase of living with cancer: more treatment. Treatment this time around begins with surgery at the end of January—then weekly chemo + daily radiation starting probably in the second week of February. As to my touring schedule, I’m still working out my calendar with the doctors, but I’ve confirmed that I can do my week-long, six-city tour of Wisconsin, February 3-8. After that, I’ll do my very best to make all the gigs I’m already committed to. And for now, my booking calendar is closed for any new engagements before May or June. I hate to disappoint, and I thank you for your kind understanding.
Dear heart, please know I am dealing REALLY WELL with this. Of course I get scared, and I’ve named my fear as a realistic dread of the inevitably noxious side-effects of chemo and radiation. BUT… I’m not beating myself up for feeling scared, and I’m changing my perspective by reflecting on the delightful paradox: chemo and radiation are exactly what’s gonna let me live longer. Wanting to live longer is new for me. I’m not used to it. But I like it. Why do I wanna live longer? Well… for you. Truly. I so enjoy being your old auntie, and what’s an old auntie without her nieces and nephews?? So, fuck dread. And fuck cancer. I’m gonna write another non-fiction book about my life with cancer… I’ll get to that after I write my novella. See, now? I do plan to be around for awhile. That’ll get me two new books, and (lots) more time with you. I’m so looking forward to that. Thank you for your love.
Here’s the bullet: The docs have scanned me, and the scan came back and it says two wonderful things: 1) There are no new cancer cells in my body and 2) The places where there was cancer have shrunk a LOT already. So the chemo and the radiation, and the supplements and change of diet are WORKING. Holy crap and yippee! It’s the best possible post-chemo scan a person can get. AND I’m still not out of the woods. Here’s what it means. It means I’ve got a good hope.
I’ve never been a big one for hope, but I always fall into it. There’s dumb hopes, and greedy hopes, and impossible hopes, and tragic hopes. But every now and then, you get a good hope, and with this scan, I just got one.
The purpose of this scan is to determine a baseline picture of cancer in my body, to match up against a more accurate PET scan that I’ll get in 2 to 3 months. Why wait 2-3 months? I’m done with chemotherapy and radiation, but they’re not done with me. The radiation and chemo are going to keep working in my body for at least that long. And THAT means I’m going to be chemo-brained, exhausted, and weak for that time. BUT NOW I HAVE A GOOD HOPE!
A special thank you to everyone who contributed to my GoFundMe account. You made this possible. Yes you did: you bought me my new diet, my trips to Chicago, my nutritional supplements—in short, you kept me alive. Thank you so very much. I've got good hope.
I have such a good hope that I’m booking gigs. The earliest I’ve got right now is a week in USA’s heartland in mid-September. If you’d like to book me to speak or perform this fall, winter or spring, please tweet me @katebornstein, or send me an email at my touring account, katebornstein at earthlink dot net. Please be kind and only use this address for touring questions.
OK—living with hope is new for me, so here I go. I promise I’ll keep eating well, taking my supplements, and exercising as I can. It took an awfully long time for me to write this, but when I get more of a brain I’ll write some more, I promise that too. So, have good hope. I love you.
It's been just over three months since my robotic lung surgery. Doc removed the top third of my right lung. Last Thursday, I got the results of a new PET CT.
The good news is they got all the lung cancer tumor. There's no cancer growing in my lungs. The not so good news is that a couple of cancer cells found their way into my lymphatic system, and they're spreading out from the site of the original tumor, more quickly than any of the docs are happy with. I'll be meeting with radiologists and oncologists and naturopaths and psychics this week, and then I'll know more about my treatment options.
Ever since my diagnosis back in September and surgery in October, I've had to examine the very real possibility of the great big goodbye. Every time I've looked hard at it, I've come up with the same conclusion: I'd rather stay alive. To this day, that's still the truth of it.
I'm not saying that what I'm going through now is the great big final cattle chute to the grave, but I need to treat it like it is—if only for rehearsal's sake. All my life, I've been curious about Death to the point of establishing a pretty good relationship with Her Ladyship. Now, it's time to establish that kind of a relationship with Life. My pal, Caitlin Sullivan, came up with that equation.
If you've read any of my books, you probably ran across one of my favorite Zen koans:
In other words, I can look at everything I do in my life through the lens of "this is just a rehearsal for everything else I have to do in life." I look at gender that way. There's a meta in gender that can be applied to other cultural binaries like race, age, class, and citizenship, among others. I wonder how much of what I've learned in postmodern gender theory will apply to the binary of life & death.
Whether I'm dying now or later isn't what's important. That I'm in the middle of yet another transition is what's important. And it doesn't matter whether or not I initiated this transition. What matters is how conscious I am, as this transition is moving forward.
So… my thoughts and life focus are switching gears. Again. And since you read my stuff, I thought it safe enough to tell you what's going on with my cancer, the same way I've been telling you what's going on with my gender. More of my focus might be on the binary of life-and-death. Fair?
I'm not giving up or giving in. I'm going to see to it to the best of my ability that the cancer is gone. I'm going to do the best I can to carry on with life. That said, I'm booking touring engagements for this winter, spring, and summer. My landlord needs his rent, and I tend to feel most alive when I'm engaged with scholars, activists, and artists. So… please do book me if you can. Here's a copy of my new catalogue:
Download KB Tours 2013-14I thought about using the tag line, "BringKate to Your Campus Before She Dies," but I decided against it. Heh.
I CAN tell you that I'm seriously considering writing a mini-memoir about this time of my life. I've already got the title: Be Careful What You Wish For: confessions of a failed suicide. Great, huh? OK… that's enough for now. I'll post more when I know more. Meantime, I've got a FaceBook page! Come visit! And thanks so much for sticking with me. I'm grateful for your company on this journey of mine.
