Breast Cancer Survivor Assists Other Women in Finding Balance Post-Surgery

A breast cancer survivor and boutique owner Kathy Garrison has been helping other women fight the life threatening illness by providing a listening ear, guidance and post-surgery products in her Bethel Park and Monroeville specialty shops.

Garrison and friend Joanne Evans opened their first K & J’s Complete Woman shop 23 years ago. The shop sells breast forms, bras and wigs made for women battling breast cancer through mastectomy, lumpectomy, radiation, chemotherapy.

“As soon as a woman is diagnosed, she should come here,” said Janna Nassida, Garrison’s niece, who runs the day-to-day operations at the Monroeville Boulevard shop with Lori Mula.

The shops are lined with non-surgical products to help breast surgery patients obtain bodily symmetry post-surgery and reclaim their appearance.

“The doctor’s job is to heal them,” Nassida said. “Our job is to do the psychological part.”

After carrying out numerous doctors’ orders—taking tests to conclude a breast cancer diagnosis, undergoing both surgery and treatment—a woman finally has a say in her appearance.

“When they come in [for the first time], they’re always nervous,” Garrison said. “They’re not sure if they’re going to look like they did before.”

But taking control of one’s appearance post-surgery is a step in regaining confidence and control of one’s life, Nassida said.

“These women come in here broken, they come in shattered,” Nassida said of the cancer victims, “and they leave conquering the world.”

Garrison agrees.

“When they get fitted for the right bra and prostheses, they forget about what they’ve been through,” she said.

Many times, however, women come in the shop not even knowing what they need.

“They know they need help, and they don’t know what to ask for,” Nassida said.

But the ladies at K & J’s Complete Woman have that covered.

“We know what to set them up with,” Nassida said.

Some items the shop carries include mastectomy and surgical bras, full and partial breast prostheses, swimwear and accessories.

The women offer pre-operation and post-operation consultations to determine what the client’s needs will be based on the type of surgery she is having. This helps women match the products that will aid them during and after the recovery.

“If they’re on the fence about reconstruction, we let them know what other products are available,” Garrison said of women conflicted with having a plastic surgeon rebuild their breast.

Many breast surgery patients don’t know that medical insurance is required to help with the costs of these post-operative garments and products, Nassida said.

While Nassida helps to fit her clients for bras, prostheses and wigs, her job title includes being a listener to the clients that come through the shop, because she said oftentimes the cancer victims need someone to hear their stories.

Garrison was diagnosed with breast cancer 28 years ago. At the time, she was a young mother with small children, and people weren’t as open to talking about breast cancer, she said. She went through surgery, chemo, radiation – “all the things people fear” – when fighting cancer. After her five-year battle, Garrison and Evans decided to open up their own boutique on Library Road in Bethel Park that would carry the products, expertise and compassion surgery-patients need.

“It’s a business you really need to have your heart and soul in,” Garrison said.

While Nassida has never been diagnosed with cancer, cancer and illness throughout her family has affected her and molded her into a caring person that her clients can open up to.

Both Nassida’s parents died of illness. Her father—Garrison’s brother—died of cancer at the same time Garrison was battling breast cancer.

While Garrison was running her Bethel Park store, sales representatives for post-surgery products were telling her there was a growing need for her services throughout the Greater Pittsburgh region.

After working in the Bethel Park shop for five years, Nassida approached her aunt about adding a shop in Monroeville to the business.

Garrison figured it was time to expand, but as the store bears her name, she wanted to make sure the essence of her company remained intact at the new location.

“I wanted to make sure the standards were the same, and I knew it would be with Jan and Lori,” she said.

Since the Monroeville shop opened in April 2010, business has been booming, Nassida said. 

She said it’s the shop's personalized approach to business that keeps the clients coming back.

“We handle patients the way we want to be treated," she said. "We were raised that way.”

Garrison hasn’t had a recurrence in 23 years, and says she’s lucky she’s done well all these years, even with her lymphedema as a battle scar from her bout with cancer. She continues seeing the same doctor that diagnosed her with breast cancer for her annual checkups, and says she thinks that her story inspires some of her clients.

“I think when people see me they say, ‘It can be OK,’” she said.

To have three other women help her with her business, each compassionate and sharing the same common goals for her clients is unique, she said.

“We keep them moving to get them back to work, get them back to life, get them back to being a full-time mother,” Nassida said. “We get them back to doing whatever they were doing.”