Kerry Dots Deliberation With Decision

Teresa Heinz Kerry, his wife, was with him in at their Sun Valley, Idaho, home. "He kind of becomes cool," she recalled. "When bad things happen, he collects his thoughts and gets a plan."

"Initially, he asked me vague questions, like, 'What exactly is cancer?' " said Kerry's daughter Vanessa, 27, a Harvard Medical School student.

One by one, he told family members. When Vanessa began to cry, he put his arms around her: "He kept saying, 'I'm so sorry you kids have to go through this.' He was worried about letting people down who had signed onto the campaign."

Between Christmas and New Year's, Kerry skied and snowboarded, contemplating a future that might include incontinence and impotence. He searched the Web for information on his options: surgery, radiation, hormones or cryosurgery. He read "Dr. Patrick Walsh's Guide to Surviving Prostate Cancer." A stack of medical articles rose on his desk.

As one former staff member put it, "Kerry likes paper." Fine print helps him decide. Michael Dukakis, governor of Massachusetts when Kerry was lieutenant governor, recalled Kerry's loyalty to the written word: "Someone brought in the first batch of bills passed. I was signing bills and talking to him, without looking at the bills. John was looking at me wide-eyed, like -- you don't read the bills?"

When Kerry had read everything about prostate cancer, he made a few discreet calls to survivors. "It was a pretty big secret," recalled Vanessa. But Kerry sought advice from former New York mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani, who had dropped out of a Senate race in 2000 to have radiation therapy. Kerry wanted to get back to the campaign as soon as possible. He spoke with former senator Bob Dole, who underwent surgery in 1991, and asked about nerve-sparing surgery.

"I told John I'd split the Viagra profits with him," quipped Dole.

In the Senate, when Kerry faces tough choices, said Stetson, "I'm always saying, 'Where is your gut on this?' He's a head guy."

But this was different, Kerry said: "It was more of a gut-heart thing than head."

When doctors had diagnosed his father in his early seventies, they had advised against surgery. They said he would die of something else first. He struggled against cancer until he died of it at 85. Kerry was determined to treat his own cancer aggressively. His wife, the daughter of an oncologist, plied him with statistics. They pointed to surgery.

Six weeks after Kerry learned that he was ill, he announced it at a news conference: "It may sound strange to some of you, but I really feel very lucky as I stand here. And the reason I feel lucky is that I'm going to be cured."

Luck, in the end, crowns Kerry's decisions. He likes to be in control -- holding off decisions until the last minute -- but he also acknowledges forces beyond his control. For all his strategizing, he has a superstitious streak. He picks up pennies. He keeps a lucky combat hat in his briefcase. On his Senate desk sits a Buddha, a gift from former senator John Glenn, which he has rubbed before important speeches.

During his prostate surgery, Kerry lay on the operating table wearing his dog tags for luck. Numbed by a spinal anesthetic, he mumbled about tax policy as the doctor cut him from the navel to his pubic bone.

Kerry joked, "Could you do a little liposuction?"