Smile Design East Bay

Former congresswoman wins battle with cancer

Nine was the magic number.

Nine was the number of laps around Duke University Hospital's surgical ward the doctor treating former East Bay Congresswoman Ellen Tauscher for cancer said she must walk in a single day if she wanted to go home.

With Fleetwood Mac's "Don't Stop" blaring through her iPod earbuds, Tauscher had just finished her second excruciating lap when she looked up.

"A woman had lapped me," said Tauscher, now the undersecretary for arms control and international security. "She was a heart-lung transplant patient. She lapped me! Heart and lung transplant? Big deal!

"I did the third lap in a half-hour," Tauscher said triumphantly.

It has been seven months since surgeons rebuilt Tauscher's cancerous esophagus, and the 59-year-old top diplomat looks divine.

Seated at a downtown San Francisco restaurant on a cool, summer morning this week, Tauscher is a slim brunette, a return to her natural color after years as a blonde, sports a dress size from her younger days and says she feels better than ever.

She was in town for meetings and to deliver a speech on nuclear weapon nonproliferation to the Commonwealth Club in Lafayette.

"I went through a period where people didn't recognize me," Tauscher said. "I would almost be on top of people I had known for a very long time, and they wouldn't see me. Then I would smile, and they would say, 'Is that you?' They were shocked. People expected me to look ill."

It was spring 2010 when Tauscher began experiencing a strange swallowing sensation. Bulky food hit what felt like a "speed bump," she said.

But she was busy. She worked in March and April on the strategic arms reduction treaty, or START, with Russia. In May, she flew repeatedly between New York and Washington, D.C., as she helped negotiate a nuclear nonproliferation deal at the United Nations.

Tauscher returned home from Pakistan last summer and saw she had lost 7 pounds in 10 days.

Her doctor said the odds were 100-to-1 that it was anything serious. But the endoscopy told a different story.

She walked into the room after the test and saw her teary-eyed husband, Jim, and an ashen-faced doctor.

"Something tells me you are not a Las Vegas handicapper," Tauscher joked.

The doctors had found a large cancerous tumor lodged in her esophagus near her lungs.

It would be OK, Tauscher repeatedly reassured her shocked and frightened parents, siblings, 20-year-daughter, Katherine, and friends.

Friday Finds « Esscentual Alchemy

As a former professional musician in the San Francisco/East Bay Area, I gained the nickname from my former band members. We were a jazz/funk band and I was the bass player  - and the only female in the group.

After performing over 22 years with the band, I retired from playing music and the “late night” crowds and became a stay-at-home mom for my 2 girls –  but as the girls grew up and found their own niches, boredom for me soon took over. I began playing in a local darts league and eventually became a national and world-ranked darts player, traveling and representing the USA and California at tournaments – and was inducted into the National Darts Hall of Fame in 2001.

I retired from playing darts a few years ago after a severe shoulder injury and again found myself stuck at home. With also having Lupus O.A. & R.A., I looked online for magnetic jewelry as a therapeutic means and realized it all looked dark drab and boring,  so I decided to try and make some myself that didn’t necessarily LOOK like magnetic jewelry.

I received many compliments on my magnetic bracelets and began creating and selling them to friends and family.  It was fun, I was making money, and I was HOOKED!

Over the past few years I’ve experimented with other styles of jewelry making,  as well as soaps, hair accessories and other git items – and opened a retail store in  March, 2009.

Oh, a couple of things. I try not to limit myself to making just one style of jewelry.  I prefer to create in as many styles as I can learn, to give a nice  variety and selection to my customers. Although I love creating pieces that come from my own inspiration, I more so love creating pieces that someone else has had a hand in designing. The smile that comes to their face when they see their ideas come to life is a great joy to me.  Additionally,  we run  and sponsor several charity events throughout the year and 25% of all of our sales from both our online venues and our B & M store is donated to the Lupus Foundation of America.

I was in the local thrift shop one day, and picked up a beautiful brooch with kind of an abstract design with purple flowers, that almost looked like it had been painted on.  I paid 50 cents for it and brought it home. After inspecting it more closely, I realized that it was in fact made from the lens of a pair of eyeglasses! The abstract design was adhered to the back of the lens and then painted over.  I decided to try and make my own and do it as a pendant (as I don’t normally wear brooches). I wanted to make mine with more “playful” designs, as summer was quickly approaching and thought these would make nice lightweight summer style necklaces.  The result?  My “Specs Appeal” recycled eyeglass lens collection!

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