When “Intuition” saved my LIFE!

So, something you may not know about me is that I used to work in the music business. I had these big dreams of being a Grammy award winning songwriter. I started out managing my best friend, Pia Toscano, who happens to be the most unbelievable singer in the entire fucking universe (if you have not heard of her, google her immediately…like right now, don’t worry, I’ll wait).  

During my time managing Pia, I met a lot of amazing people in the music business. I had an entertainment lawyer and my own management company (I was kind of a big deal….no I wasn’t). I also managed a rather busy and large recording studio in NYC and was really coming into my own. I had an extremely exciting life and a bright future in music (If I do say so myself). One day my lawyer called me and told me about his friend in LA that was starting a new independent record label and was looking for someone to help him run it…. Hmmm Los Angeles, that sounded amazing (“Welcome to Hollywood, what’s your dream?”). A week after I received that call, I was on a plane heading to LA to interview for the job. I met with my lawyers’ friend, we instantly connected and 15 minutes after the interview ended, he called me and offered me the job. I flew home the next day and quit my job, packed up all of my belongings and moved across the country with nowhere to live, no mode of transportation and only 1 friend in LA (what was I thinking!?). I was 22 years old and I knew if I didn’t go, I would regret it for the rest of my life. Before I moved, I was in a horrible relationship which I ended abrubtly. As you ladies know, heartbreak collar bones and recently cheated on abs are AMAZING…So I looked and felt really goooooooooood!(too bad I didn’t know Vanessa yet, we would have totally killed it in LA). I was skinny, I was tan, my hair was on point and my boobs were perky!. The new “West Coast me” fit in perfectly. I was meeting new amazing and successful people, I was dating interesting men and having the time of my life. I had a great apartment in West Hollywood, I was partying with celebrities and felt like this was exactly where I was meant to be…. Until it wasn’t.

I woke up one morning to a woman’s voice. I heard her loud and clear, she kept repeating the same few words “you need to go home, you need to go home” I jumped up immediately and literally searched the apartment…. Who the hell was saying that!?.  There was no one there, but I kept hearing it “you need to go home you need to go home”. I obviously ignored this but over the next few days I fell into a deep depression. I had this constant “pit” in my stomach and felt dizzy. I was plagued with panic attacks and it got so bad that one day I actually ended up in the hospital (Cedar Sinai is no joke, now I know why so many celebrities go there to “rest”). My friends were so confused. I went from being this happy-go-lucky living- my- best -life girl to a sad, depressed person who didn’t want to leave her apartment. I couldn’t tell anyone about the voice I repeatedly heard, anyone with half a brain would have thought I was crazy (at this point, I was still in the dark about my “gift”). But the anxiety I felt was becoming unbearable and the constant feeling of wanting to jump out of my skin was increasing. After a few weeks I couldn’t handle it anymore, I packed up all my things and moved back to NY.  

I walked out of JFK airport with my head hung low (and instant road rage), I felt like a failure. I was a failure and I didn’t even know why. I left behind fancy dinners at the Beverly Wilshire, a king size bed in my own apartment and a cell phone filled with celebrity phone numbers in exchange for family dinners in my parents’ house, a twin size bed in my childhood bedroom and the unemployment line. WHAT THE FUCK was wrong with me?!. At least skinny me returned to NY and my new found love affair with Botox.

I spent many sleepless nights trying to figure out what was next for me – Do I stay in the music business? Do I try to grow up and get serious with my life? Do I start dating again? (I mean I still looked really good, I might as well share that with someone, I’m very generous like that). I ended up getting my first corporate job selling staffing services…in the middle of a fucking recession!! I left a place where dreams come true for a place where dreams go to die (but remember, I am a medium, so don’t worry if your dreams die, I can still talk to them for you lol). I was deeeeeeeepressed, so I did what any normal depressed 24 year old girl would do, I called my plastic surgeon (Yes, I had a plastic surgeon and yes, I had a very big crush on him). I was back in NY working for 3 months at this point , I hadn’t heard that voice telling me to “go home” since LA. The pit in my stomach was also gone so I figured I would treat myself to some Botox…a little “you’re surviving girl” gift… like a pat on the back except with needles and a forehead (plus a few minutes of flirting with my silver fox Dr. was good for my soul).

 I put on my cutest little tank top dress, a full face of make-up and headed to his office. When he walked in, I started showing him the places on my face that needed a little “boost”. As he was examining my face, he noticed these little red lesions I had on my cheek (I guess I didn’t do my make-up as well as I thought). I obviously knew I had these little marks but was more concerned with covering them up than actually finding out what they were. They weren’t pimples, I knew that much, and he wasn’t sure what they were either. He told me he wasn’t “that concerned” but he did want me to go see a dermatologist. He had a very good friend who was a world-renowned dermatologist and she was only a few blocks away. He gave her a call and told me that she could see me right away. I instantly started to have a conversation with myself “why does he want me to go right now? Am I dying? Omg, I’m totally dying” I fought back tears as I left his office and started walking to hers. I did what I always do in stressful situations, I called my sister. She calmed me down and told me it is probably just precautionary and that I wasn’t dying, but I should just go and check it out.

 I arrived at her office about 10 minutes later, the waiting-room was filled with Real Housewives of New York City and the cutest office dog that I played with the entire time as I waited to get called in (it totally took my attention away from the horrible pit in my stomach that had returned during my walk over). After about 15 minutes, a super cute female assistant called my name and escorted me to an exam room. She set me up in the room and was flirting with me hard the entire time(omg, did I just change my sexual preference right before I found out I was dying? I didn’t, I just apparently really liked the attention). Anyway, the doctor walked-in and she was a tiny, attractive woman, dripping in diamonds and wearing Gucci flats. She got right down to business… she took one look at my face and said “oh that’s nothing, it’s hormone related” THANK FUCKING G-D!! As I was getting up, she noticed a small beauty mark on my arm and asked me to sit back down. (side note – I am probably one of the palest people you will ever meet, I’m basically translucent, I also have over 100 beauty marks/freckle’s covering my body…sounds attractive right? Thanks for being Irish dad). Anyway, out of all these beauty marks, from the corner of her eye, she spots this little tiny one on my arm. I sat back down and she put on these crazy magnifying glasses to get a closer view… she took the glasses off and said, I need to remove it and send it in for a biopsy. What? Why? That little pit in my stomach was growing by the second. After the biopsy she told me she would call me in about a week with the results and I walked out of her office with a Band-Aid on my arm and a sinkhole in my stomach. 

Two days later, I received a call from the receptionist asking if I could come into the office now to speak with the Doctor. I was at work in the middle of a mandatory online training and I told her that I was unable to come in but I could speak to the Doctor over the phone. She put me on hold for what seemed like an eternity but after about a minute the Doctor came on. She too, asked me to come into the office as she didn’t like to give results over the phone – UUMM too bad lady!. When she finally realized that I wasn’t coming in, she said “okay, I got your results – you have Stage 1 Melanoma, you would have been dead or dying within 6 months if we didn’t catch this. I need you to come in tomorrow, I have to remove a larger section of your arm to make sure we get all of the cancer”. I went numb… during the conversation, I texted my sister “Dina, I have cancer” by the time I hung up with the Doctor, my sister was outside my office in a taxi waiting to take me home. My sister had already alerted our mom and as a typical mother would, she called the Doctor directly to hear it for herself. No mother should ever hear the words “your child has cancer”. By 10 am the next morning, I was back in the Doctor’s office with my mother and sister, having a chunk of cancer filled skin cut out of my arm. 

At that moment, everything started to make sense. That voice I heard in LA telling me “you have to go home”, that pit in my stomach that forced me to board that plane back to NY- that was my good friend, INTUITION. Had I not listened to it, I would most likely not be here today sharing my stories with all of you. If I can teach people just one thing, it would be this:

LISTEN TO YOUR INTUITION, SHE KNOWS HER SHIT! (or HE knows HIS shit or THEY know THEIR shit..) And one day, it might even save your life…G-d knows home-girl saved mine. 

XXO,

Cassandra