Then her mind flashes from that war — one that defined the United States — to a more personnel fight — one that defined her.
Twenty years ago, Gardner-Culbertson, then 63, was diagnosed with colon cancer, and a two years later, breast cancer followed. After being diagnosed with colon cancer, as a precaution, she was tested every six months for breast cancer.
“It didn’t make sense to me,” she said of the diagnosis.
“We were horrified,” said her husband, Bill Culbertson.
When a spouse, a relative, a friend is told they have cancer, it can be attacked it as a team. Every sentence begins with “we.”
Gardner-Culbertson had a double mastecomy, and is a 20-year cancer survivor, an anniversary she recently realized after reading stories about other survivors.
“You know, some women died after, what, three years,” she said. “How did I get so lucky?”
Lucky people win lotteries. They are not thought of as having colon and breast cancer.
“I’m alive,” she said. And kicking.
Well, not exactly. She fell in her Middletown home on The Alameda last December, fractured her ankle and she walks with a slight limp. But she’s making progress. When you’ve beaten cancer — twice — a busted right ankle must feel like a bruise.
“You can never give up hope,” she said. “There are going to be ups and downs, but you have to keep fighting.”
She was born on a tiny Greek island, and her family moved to France when she was 4. She married Middletown native Jack “John” Gardner, an Army soldier who was fighting in the war in France.
They lived in Middletown, where they raised their five children. He died in 1991, and she married Culbertson six years later. They’ve been married for 12 years, but every day is a honeymoon.
“He still opens and closes the door for me,” she said.
About the Author
