Regina Brett: A moving series called "Inheritance'

Regina Brett and daughter Gabrielle

Ten years ago, former BJ staffer and now PD columnist Regina Brett wrote four columns after being diagnosed with breast cancer. Now she presents four columns about what her daughter, Gabrielle, inherited from her.. “These were far more difficult to write, ” she notes.

But let Regina explain it far better in her own words.

Would you want to know if you carried a gene for a potentially fatal disease? If you found out you had that gene, would you want your child to know if she carried it, too?

It's a terrible legacy to pass on. A mutation in every single cell of your body. I have one. It's called BRCA1. It's one of the breast cancer genes.

There are so many traits I want to pass on to my daughter. A gene for a fatal disease isn't one of them.

Ten years ago, I wrote four columns after being diagnosed with breast cancer. Today I present four columns about what my daughter inherited from me. These were far more difficult to write.

Our story begins with a test.

The test: Did I pass the breast-cancer gene to my daughter?

Before we left the house that morning, my daughter, Gabrielle, and I braced ourselves for the news we didn't want to hear.

We steadied ourselves with prayers and hugs and hoped for the best.

We knew better.

As the mother, I needed to be the strong one. My heart was breaking but I couldn't show it, couldn't let my daughter know how sad I felt, how scared. This was the day we would learn if I had given her a gene that could kill her.

The drive to the genetics center Feb. 21, 2002, seemed so long even though it is only a few minutes' drive to University Hospitals. We walked through the hospital maze to the Center for Human Genetics. I remembered these halls too well. It was like entering my own personal haunted house. This was where I got the cancer verdict in 1998, the MRIs, bone scans and ultrasounds to see if the cancer had spread beyond my breast. The surgery took place upstairs, radiation treatments in the basement. Three years later, I received genetic testing here and as a result -- oh, my heart ached for her -- I had both of my breasts removed.

This was different.

Click on the headline to read the columns and view a video and more photos


This was my daughter.