A Conspiracy of Denial M arsha's unrelenting quest for miracle cures and distrust of traditional medicine got in the way of her facing the prospect of death. Marsha died of metastasized breast cancer. But as a mother with two young children, she resisted coming to terms with her illness until the very end of her life. Marsha's motivation was linked to the first encounter she had as a breast cancer patient. Marsha dealt with doctors who were unsympathetic to her disease and to her difficulty with having a mastectomy.
People are most vulnerable when they discover how ill they are . . .
She eventually found a breast cancer clinic and had better relationships with her physicians. But when her cancer spread and it became evident that traditional treatment was no longer working, Marsha refused to accept her fate. There was a conspiracy of denial. Mickey and a physician friend were the ones to make her accept that she was dying and needed to say goodbye to her family and her friends. M ickey's friend Richard also was consumed with finding a miracle cure for his terminal brain cancer.