We have been in the hospital since January 22. It's been a very dicey time during which we spent two days unconscious on an assistive breathing device and had liters of fluid drawn off a lung with long needles between the ribs.
This is the first column we have been able to write in this time. That is what cancer does: it robs you of normalcy, energy and your sense of self. It is exhausting. Despite ads for drugs like Keytruda, it is often a full-time job that makes it impossible to live your life as you knew it pre-cancer.
We've been blessed to have thousands of people among our 160,000 Twitter/X followers praying for us, from celebrity followers to our dedicated Bay Area Reporter readers. For nearly every day of this hospitalization we have felt exhausted, unmoored and scared as hell. At times we just prayed we would not die.
It is into that lived experience we have been watching two new limited series about women who claimed to have cancer but didn't. Their stories have left us angry, flummoxed and even betrayed.
Scamalot
ABC's original documentary series (with episodes streaming next day on Hulu) "Scamanda" tells the story of Amanda Riley, California housewife, mother and cancer blogger. It could not be a more captivating tale of charisma, manipulation and greed.
Riley created a blog that became tremendously popular in which she posted about her cancer, lymphoma, and her harrowing treatments. She charted every experience, talked about clinical trials, about not being able to even sit up in bed some days, about nearly dying.
It is an utterly compelling story in which Riley posted photos of herself in hospital settings with IVs, with her head shaved and more. She had humor and charm and drew people to her. Riley's story of a beautiful young woman fighting for her life is mesmerizing. It is easy to see how her blog posts – she has a real facility with language – drew people to her.
Everyone wanted to be part of TeamAmanda and help this courageous fighter survive a devastating diagnosis. Riley also belonged to a mega church, the members of which literally threw money at her after she talked about her experience and how it brought her closer to God.
Soon TeamAmanda became a thing with Riley soliciting funds for treatments she said were bankrupting her. Celebrities like Lee Ann Rimes posted their support while others signed onto monthly donations. She was garnering thousands of dollars online at her website as well as in-kind contributions in gifts and services like free daycare for her young children.
But some things didn't add up and soon an investigative reporter was delving into Riley's conflicting claims and all the many treatment centers at which she said she was enrolled in cutting edge clinical trials.
Yet accusing a noted cancer patient of faking her cancer wasn't an easy task. It would take time to peel back the layers of deception and greed and land in a wire fraud case against her and her husband. We can't wait to see what happens next.
Built on a lie
Netflix's stellar and maddening new original series, "Apple Cider Vinegar" just dropped. In this series Kaitlyn Dever ("Dopesick") plays Belle Gibson, a powerful internet influencer in the 2010s who claimed to have conquered terminal brain cancer through lifestyle changes and diet.
While Amanda Riley was only asking people for money for herself, Gibson was doing something much more nefarious: She was luring people with cancer with false promises of cures for their devastating diagnoses.
Dever's Gibson is vividly compelling as she builds a retinue of followers who are themselves desperate to survive their own cancer diagnoses. Her seeming honesty and authenticity about her own survival reveal her as a manipulative charmer. As each of the six episodes announce, "This is a true story built on a lie."
"Apple Cider Vinegar" explores Gibson's narcissism and her traumatic childhood and need for attention. It also delves into her conflicts with and envy of another influencer, Milla Blake (Alicia Debnam-Carey). The main distinction between the two women is that Blake does indeed have cancer, but promotes a non-traditional approach to healing. Throughout "Apple Cider Vinegar" different players in Gibson's life and circle weigh in and each one makes the story both more captivating and more convoluted.
Both Riley and Gibson rose to their respective fame at a time when the internet influencer was a new societal character and social media was just taking off. That factors into their prominence and how people were drawn to them and their stories.
These tales of women faking cancer raise so many questions. What was a red flag for us and the close friend of Riley's who connected with the investigative journalist is that despite myriad posts in which she said she couldn't even sit up in bed she was so sick, Riley never looked sick. She wasn't bloated from massive steroids nor did she have the sickly pallor so many of us have. She always looked pretty and most of all healthy.
What unnerves as "Apple Cider Vinegar" evolves is how these fake cures threaten people's lives and their possibility of survival. Much as we would all prefer a coffee enema and juicing to chemo and radiation – we had five surgeries in December – the road to survival is not simply a better diet, shots of apple cider vinegar and longer walks. Those things won't hurt you and many cancer centers incorporate non-traditional alternative medicine like acupuncture, yoga, meditation and dietary changes into their overall plan.
But as "Apple Cider Vinegar" reveals, our fear of cancer is such, we cannot help searching for easier methods to save our very lives. And because we never talk about cancer as a society, the facts of how many of us have it or that a third of those who get it will die are unknown to most Americans.
Our PSA to you is this: 1 in 2 Americans will get cancer and cancer is impacting Americans at younger and younger ages. There are 21 million Americans with cancer right now.
So get tested. Stop smoking and vaping. Don't drink to excess. Do the Cologuard test for colon cancer. Get a mammogram and a prostate exam. If you are 45 or under, get the HPV vaccine which protects against several cancers in women and men. Do your best to save your life.
Home again
TV is notorious for running PSAs about Black History Month but not providing backup programming. Black stories remain under-represented on network, cable and streaming services.
Into that milieu debuts "Clean Slate," executive-produced by comedy legend Norman Lear, where trans actress Laverne Cox is once again revealed to be a versatile and highly nuanced performer.
The eight-episode original series developed by Cox and comedian George Wallace for Amazon Prime is a sweet and complex tale of father daughter rapprochement after a long hiatus.
Cox plays Desiree, a trans woman who returns home to small town Alabama after her life falls apart. She will be seeing her father, Harry Slate, a car-wash owner, who is eager to meet with his son after a 23-year hiatus.
But the child who arrives on his doorstep is his transitioned daughter not his son, and so Harry must come to terms with this radical change and find renewed love for his daughter as he had for his son.
No doubt many viewers will raise an eyebrow or two over this scenario as the Deep South has not been a good place for Black trans women or trans people in general. But Cox and Wallace have good chemistry and this is a series well worth watching.
Buzz
The first two episodes of season three of the queer thriller series "Yellowjackets" dropped on Paramount+ on Valentine's Day. What an amuse bouche it is to have this fabulous series back for another delve into the lives of four women who as teenagers were members of an elite soccer team who survived a plane crash, cannibalism and a "Lord of the Flies" devolution into ferality.
The always fabulous Melanie Lynskey and Juliette Lewis, Tawny Cypress, Lauren Ambrose and Christina Ricci play the adults still coming to terms with what happened in their collective past. It's well worth watching, but you must watch from the first season.
So, for all the enticements and excitements, you know you really must stay tuned.
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