Published on March 25, 2010

Cancer Survivor Performs Center for Breast Health Benefit

Christina Marie Myatt's cancer journey began with a few choice expletives.

More than four years later, she's singing Broadway show tunes.

Myatt, a breast cancer survivor, never envisioned being an advocate for beast self-exams and an example for those who face the dreaded diagnosis. But it's a role she's assumed with the same vigor in which she choreographs a high school musical or performs in a local theater production.  That role has  led her to help raise awareness and money for the Genesis Center for Breast Health, which fostered her recovery, through an April 3 cabaret at Davenport's Col Ballroom.

"An Evening with Christina Marie" will feature Myatt on vocals singing a mix of Broadway favorites and big band classics, accompanied by Thea Engelson on piano, and the Rod Pierson (Not-so) Big Band.  The evening also will feature a silent auction and 50/50 drawings.  Tickets for the 7:30 p.m. show are $15 and can be reserved by calling (563) 391-3174, or by visiting centerstage-arts.com.

The Center for Breast Health offers the latest diagnostic technology and breast health specialists in one location, to detect early signs of breast cancer in women with no complaints or symptoms.

"Everyone at Genesis was so wonderful to me.  I just felt like all these people came forward for me and now it's my turn to give something back," says Myatt.  "I've found a way to use what were unequivocally the most horrible moments in my life to do something that can be good for other people."

Those horrible moments started in late 2005 when Myatt found a lump during a breast self-examination.  A mammography, then an ultrasound and finally a biopsy at the Center for Breast Health led to the diagnosis of an aggressive Stage 1 Intraductal Carcinoma.

"You can't print what went through my mind when they told me I had cancer," says Myatt.  "Those profanities are your very first thoughts."

Within days, Myatt was sitting in the office of surgeon Joseph Lohmuller, M.D., FACS, then medical director of the Center for Breast Health.  Dr. Lohmuller performed a lumpectomy, followed later by a second surgery to make sure adequate tissue around the cancer was removed.

Then came six rounds of chemotherapy overseen by Shobha Chitneni, M.D. and six weeks of radiation under the care of Christine Sharis, M.D.

Myatt and her husband made the decision not to tell their children, ages three and seven at the time, about the cancer.  Myatt says she wanted their lives to stay normal and not be about cancer.  And Myatt wanted her routine to be as normal as possible too.  She stayed on the job as the Putnam Museum's theatrical programming coordinator, only missing work following her surgeries and during chemotherapy treatments.  She received radiation treatments during her lunch hour.

She also stayed active in the arts away from work, choreographing Pleasant Valley High School's "Crazy for You" and directing Countryside Community Theatre's 2006 production of "Oliver!" while undergoing chemotherapy.

While Myatt was directing "Oliver!," cast member Susan McPeeters, then the host of the WQPT television program, "Perspectives," marveled at the strength she showed in continuing to work, care for her family and remain active in the theatre.  McPeeters was convinced Myatt's story would inspire other women battling cancer, and along with one of the nurses at Hematology-Oncology Associates of the Quad-Cities, P.C., convinced her to appear on the program.

It marked the beginning of a new phase of her cancer journey.

"I'd never hoped to be any poster child for cancer.  But after I was on the program, people would come up to me and say, ‘You know, I'm going to get my mammogram now,'" says Myatt.  "I came to realize that part of the journey is becoming an advocate, that you have to tell people you need to do this.  So I got involved."

That involvement includes the Komen Quad Cities Race for the Cure and in her latest effort, putting together the Center for Breast Health musical benefit.  The show is part Myatt's story, part information and education and part songs that are uplifting and fun.

"It kind of speaks to my whole approach of going through my cancer journey," says Myatt.  "The evening should be about hope.  That the more you educate people about doing self-exams and the more they understand there are services out there for those who can't afford them, those are things that are hopeful.  Cancer doesn't have to be a death sentence anymore."

Indeed, cancer free today, Myatt is the owner/artistic director of Davenport's Center Stage Performing Arts Academy and president of the Countryside Community Theatre's board of directors.  She remains thankful for the wonderful treatment of her doctors and for the continued care and compassion shown by the Center for Breast Health.  Because sponsors are covering all expenses associated with her show, 100 percent of the ticket sales and silent auction proceeds will go to Genesis.

"I'm giving it to a place that I believe in so it can help others," says Myatt.  "People think you have to go away to get cancer care, but I'm here to say you don't.  There's a wonderful system here. Genesis and the Center for Breast Health have just been marvelous all the way through this."

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