Resilience in Body and in Democracy

September 30, 2025

Today I go in for my fourth biopsy. It’s CT-guided, meant to check what still lingers in the tumors that remain. On Monday I was in Virginia for a platelet infusion, and today I’ll have another one here in New York. These transfusions have become part of the rhythm of my life, mileposts on a road I never wanted to travel, but ones that keep me moving forward.

I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t apprehensive. I don’t want them to find anything new. But if they do, at least we’ll know, and knowledge means treatment, and treatment means hope. That’s the rhythm too: fear and relief, exhaustion and determination, endings and new beginnings.

As I sit with that tension, I can’t help but see the same struggle mirrored in the world I’ve devoted my career to. While I fight to hold my body together, I’m also watching the Inspector General institution, the watchdog meant to protect citizens and keep government honest, being slowly dismantled. Just as cancer weakens the body from within, the erosion of oversight weakens our democracy. Both make me sad. Both make me angry. Both remind me that resilience is not optional; it’s the only way forward.

So today, I will do what I can. I will show up for this biopsy. I will take the infusion. I will hold on to hope. I will keep believing that what is fragile, whether a body or an institution, can still be worth fighting for.