Peter Criss –
legendary drummer and founding member of KISS – recently revealed he’d
undergone a battle with breast cancer. A disease wrongly perceived as
only affecting women, Criss is part of the 1% of males diagnosed with
the malady each year. Now pronounced cancer free, Criss, in the middle
of finishing off a new solo album, spoke with Pop Entertainment
correspondent, Ken Sharp.
How are you doing
today?
I’m working today
and that to me is a gift because it makes me go down to my recording
studio and get this rock and roll album going so I can get this out in
the summer. I did all the major tracks last year and then I had Richie
Scarlet come over a few months ago and put down bass on ten songs. The
record is very heavy, not metal. But it’s heavier than what I usually do
and I’m very excited about it.
You were diagnosed
with breast cancer in February 2008.
Yeah, it’s been
tough. I said on the news that I had breast cancer and didn’t tell a
soul beside my family and that was not easy. I once had a run-in with
the tabloids in the ‘80s where they were saying I was sleeping in
toilets and I had to sue them. (Ed. Note: This person was
revealed to be an imposter.) I told my wife Gigi, “Look what they did to
(Patrick) Swayze and Farrah Fawcett.” We never mentioned anything about
this until I got my big checkup and I was clear. This month is Breast
Cancer awareness and I felt now was the time to say something.
Like many others,
I never realized than men could get breast cancer.
Yeah, me neither.
I didn’t know that either but I’ve been educating myself more and more
about it. But getting back to your first question, I’m a physical guy.
I’ve been half naked onstage and been in spandex all my life. I really
know my body well. I’m still in phenomenal shape and go to the gym at
least four days a week and I’m drumming pretty much every day in my home
studio. One day I get back from the gym and I laid down in bed watching
the news and felt my left nipple and it was hard as a rock. I felt a
lump in it and it hurt a lot and I thought, “What is this?” I thought I
may have had a cyst and could have hurt myself lifting weights. Breast
cancer was the furthest thought from my mind. I’m really lucky I have my
wife, Gigi. I told her about it and she was going to the gynecologist so
she said, “Come with me.” When we got there her doctor checked me out
and she said, “You know Peter, if my husband had this I would only send
him to one place and that’s it.” I started getting a little nervous at
this point. She said, “I’m gonna send you over to Dr. Alex Swistel who
is the head of New York-Presbyterian, the greatest hospital on the
planet. This guy was my angel come true. I go to see him and in the
visiting room are all women and they’re all bald and it’s really
depressing. I was the only guy there and I was really scared. I thought:
God, what did I do? I don’t get high. I go to church. I’ve got a
wonderful big house. I’ve got money. I’ve got a beautiful wife and a
granddaughter who’s now two years-old. Please don’t lay this on me. Dr.
Swistel checks me out and sends me to this place in Jersey to do a
biopsy. I had the biopsy and the report came back that I was cool, all
they had to do was go in there and remove it. I was happy to hear that.
I knew all along it was a cyst. Dr. Swistel does the operation and
everything’s great and I go home that same night. Less than a week later
he calls and goes, “Are you sitting or standing?” I’ll tell you, if
someone tells you that your bells go off immediately: Oh my God,
something wrong! He told me, “Look Peter, you have cancer. But don’t
pass out on me because you caught it immediately so you won’t need chemo
or to lose that great black Italian hair.” He said he had to operate on
me again to literally remove the nipple and go into my breast and take
the lymph nodes out under my arms. Now I’m going in again and now I know
I have cancer. My blood pressure must have been about a million. I was
so scared going in for this. I went in for the operation and went home
that same night. He called me a few days later and said, “You are cool.
There’s no cancer, I’ve got everything.”
My slogan is early
detection. You need to go immediately and have yourself checked out,
don’t sit around and act like it’s gonna go away in two weeks.”
Bullshit! Men need to get regular check-ups. It’s only 1% of men who are
diagnosed with breast cancer but that can always go up so you need to
stay on it.
All this time I
did a lot of praying. After recently getting a clean bill of health, I
wanted to step forward and tell the world about this. First we put the
news out on my web site (www.petercriss.net)
and then it became Pandora’s Box. The next thing I became flooded to be
a spokesperson. I’m doing as much as I can do for Breast Cancer
Awareness Month. I don’t want to be a crusader. I don’t want to be a
holy roller. I don’t need a pat on the bat or more accolades. I just
want to tell my story and hoping this will help educate and raise
awareness for guys about Breast Cancer as there’s no literature in a
doctor’s office on this problem, it’s all for women. I would love to see
that change. I would like to see guys, no matter who they are, to get
off the couch if he feels something in his nipple to under his arm or
near his privates and get checked out.
Cancer’s
not discriminatory.
Right. I mean, I
was a superhero with KISS; they’ve got comic books about me. It can
happen to anybody. Men can be stupid and ignorant not to do anything
about it. You have to go see someone right away. If I didn’t go see
someone right away you wouldn’t be talking to me now.
Going through this
battle, how has it affected the way you live your life now?
Going through it
was very depressing. I was seeing an analyst, not a psychiatrist because
they give you drugs and I don’t want drugs. I want to talk about it.
That went on for awhile and that really helped me. Now I look at things
like this: the past is gone and the future we don’t know. I concentrate
on the present and look at every day that I wake up as spare time for me
to have a fucking field day. I told you earlier that I was working on a
new CD. For a while I didn’t have a lot of the words done but now I’ve
been down in the studio working on lyrics and I’m getting very close to
putting down vocals.
You’ve become even
more inspired.
Yeah. I’m at the
gym every day. I always was a physical guy. I eat very well. I eat a lot
of fruit, salads, chicken and fish, not a lot of meat. I‘ve taken
vitamins for the last 40 years. You need to take of yourself. My
attitude has really changed. How can I not be so grateful? I’ve also got
a book in the works too.
What message would
you like to tell people?
Cancer is nothing
to fool around with, it’ll kill you. I have to impress upon people once
again that early detection is so important. If you feel a lump somewhere
immediately go to a doctor and get checked. If I didn’t do it myself I
wouldn’t be here today.
For more info:
http://www.nationalbreastcancer.org/
www.petercriss.net
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