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Looking at Paula Franks' radiant smile, you never would imagine the pain she has suffered during the past five years. The Lawrence resident's glowing outlook on life has proven nothing is strong enough to keep her down - not even a failed kidney, breast cancer twice, ovarian cysts and cancerous ovaries.

With the exception of occasional pain during her menstrual cycles, Franks hadn't been ill since a Wilms' tumor enveloped her left kidney when she was 18 months old. But at 31, she felt a discharge leak from her right nipple. Since she had not had children, there was no reason for her breast to be leaking fluid.

She saw a doctor, who diagnosed her with right inductal, noninvasive breast cancer. The biopsy showed malignant calcifications, meaning the disease had spread throughout the entire breast. "I was floored," says Franks, who was living in Chicago at the time. "It took a day or two for it to really hit me."

She was shocked that she had breast cancer, because she was so young. But actually, her doctors reminded her she was a high-risk candidate. She had taken birth control pills for 12 years, which her doctor told her was the worst thing she could ever do. Plus, breast cancer ran in the family. In addition, African-American women have a higher mortality rate from breast cancer than any other race, because the disease often is diagnosed in its later stages, according to the National Cancer Institute.

When Franks finally realized what was happening to her, she cried and prayed repeatedly. "I was, like, ÔLord, what could I have done to deserve this?' " says the self-described old-fashioned Baptist.

Her faith and religious upbringing helped her survive the illnesses emotionally. "Her faith has always been her strength," says her minister, Darryl Taylor of Paraclete Life Missionary Baptist Church. After talking with her minister in Chicago and a number of church members, she "felt a peace" about her before the surgery.

In addition to the spiritual support she received from her church, she benefited from her strong family ties. Franks' mother feared her daughter wouldn't be able to handle the emotional loss of her breast. "As a woman, this surgery is very hard to deal with," admits Franks, who worried that people would look at her oddly.

Fortunately, her aunt Verneal Porter, who had survived breast cancer 10 years prior, told Franks exactly what to expect. Typically, a mastectomy lasts three to four hours, but Franks' lasted six to seven hours because the doctors performed three separate surgeries: a mastectomy, reconstruction and a reduction of the left breast.

After the surgery, the doctors didn't find any cancer cells left in Franks' lymph nodes, so they decided she didn't need chemotherapy and radiation.

Although she was slightly depressed for a couple of weeks, she healed well, taking off two months from work. It helped that she had so much support. "My friends never treated me any differently and loved me for being me," says Franks, who realized breast cancer wasn't the worse thing in the world.

She soon returned to her position at Pioneer Financial Services and didn't show any adverse effects from the surgeries. She saw new opportunities and adventures in front of her. Conseco bought Pioneer and offered her a job as an associate communications counselor at the insurance firm's Indianapolis headquarters.

A month after she moved to Indianapolis in August, 1997, her mother's transplanted liver failed. While running back and forth to Chicago to visit her mother, Franks felt a lump on the lower half of her right breast - the same place the cancer had struck before. "This was bad timing," she says. "I just got a new job, and I was caring for my mother."

She forgot about the lump for a couple of weeks. By the third week, though, she thought it seemed more noticeable. The same week Franks found out her mother was dying, her breast biopsy revealed the lump was malignant. "I told the doctor, ÔMy mother's not going to live much longer,' " she says. "ÔLet me deal with my family situation first.' "

A few days later, her mother died. On the Monday following her mother's burial on Saturday, she started her first of four chemotherapy treatments. "At that point, I thought my family was cursed," she says.

The chemo was much more physically draining than the surgery had been. In fact, she had her four chemotherapy treatments performed in Chicago, so she could stay with her sisters during recovery. From September to December of 1997, she worked three weeks and then traveled to Chicago for a week. There she underwent a day of treatment. The chemo hit her body so hard that she needed an entire week to recover.

As soon as she began chemotherapy, her hair started falling out. "It's so weird; it comes out in tufts," recalls the 36-year-old, who wore either a braided wig or a scarf. "For every woman, it's tragic. But I knew it was going to happen, so I prepared myself for it."

No one realized her "hair" was a wig until May of 1998. "That made me feel pretty good," she says, adding that her skin darkened, as well.

In February of 1998, she began radiation treatments every day for seven weeks. She worked from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m., then drove to Methodist Hospital for radiation. She stayed in Indianapolis to undergo the radiation, because it wasn't as hard on her body as the chemotherapy.

Not only was Conseco flexible about her hours, the company showed its compassionate side. Franks felt her boss, Jim Rosensteele, acted as a surrogate father during that time. "He was so supportive of anything I needed to do," she says.

Rosensteele speaks highly of Franks. "We just wanted her to understand that nothing she would do would interfere with our thoughts of her," says the vice president of corporate communications.

She recovered quickly from the breast cancer. However, by 1999 her monthly cycles caused enough pain that she went to her gynecologist, Dr. Evelyn White, who proceeded to remove the cysts from her ovaries. At the time, White suggested Franks have a hysterectomy due to her cancer-ridden background. Because she had not had children, Franks balked at ending that possibility.

Instead, she focused on caring for Porter, who died of liver cancer in March of 2000, and her best friend, Denise Jackson, who died of breast cancer that spread to her brain in April of 2000.

During Franks' April menstrual cycle, she was in so much pain, she couldn't get out of bed for three days. "I knew something was wrong, because I had no appetite and a fever of 102 that wouldn't go away," she recalls. Besides, she'd lost 43 pounds in recent months. "I thought a lot of my problem was grief. Denise's death didn't make any sense to me. She was an active Christian and a mother of three."

White, though, says Franks was bleeding heavily, causing her iron level to drop, and becoming anemic.

After a week, Franks called oncologist Dr. T. Howard Lee, who sent her to St. Vincent Hospital, where technicians ran every test from blood levels to a colonoscopy because of her background. White noted that the cysts from the year before had returned, but they were disfigured. After two weeks in the hospital, Franks returned home. Two days later, her May cycle started. She couldn't even walk the three feet from her bed to her bathroom. When she did try to walk, her legs trembled. Once again, her fever shot up to 102.

She headed back to St. Vincent. When doctors tried to give her blood, she refused the four pints out of fear of contamination. In less than 30 minutes, Lee was at her bedside warning her in a calm voice, "Paula, your white count is dangerously low.

If you don't ... take this blood, it will only be a matter of hours before your heart gives out." "I took the blood," she says. However, her fever didn't go away. The hospital staff ran all of the tests again, thinking they had missed something.The results still came out the same.

Finally, Lee and White figured out that the ovarian cysts had burst and infected Franks' entire reproductive system. As a result of the chemotherapy and the scar tissue caused by the removal of the earlier cysts, according to Franks, the doctors couldn't even detect her uterus through an ultrasound or CT scan. Her reproductive organs looked like one big clump of tissue.

The doctors broke the heartrending news: She needed a hysterectomy. After crying over the children she would never have, Franks thought about the women in her life who were not her biological mother: Fannie Ballard, Cheralynn Champion, Mattie Peoples, Mary Taylor and her aunt Shirley King. They had been there for her during her surgeries, especially since her mother had died.

"You don't have to have babies to be a mother," declares Franks, who calls each of those women "Mom."

The doctors expected to find infectious tissue, but not cancer. Not until the final pathology (the last batch of tests) were they able to determine the problem with the ovaries. And they didn't find the cancer until they were actually doing the hysterectomy.

Even more surprising, instead of ovarian cancer, the doctors discovered traces of the same type of cancer that originated in her breast cells. The breast cancer had spread undetected to her reproductive system.

The surgery took a toll on her body. Franks couldn't believe how she looked after surgery. Drainage tubes emerged from her body in every direction, like pins sticking out of a pincushion. Her appearance, in addition to her physical and mental anguish, dampened her spirits.

While lying in recovery, she came to the conclusion that her life was over. "Lord, just help me. I'm ready to go," she recalls praying. "I don't know why I have to go through all this trauma. I'm ready to go. I can't have any children. This is too painful to bear. This is too hard. I'm ready." Luckily, she says she heard God tell her to keep going.

"It's like I heard a sermon during my entire recovery," she believes. "One thing I've learned in my 36 years of life is no matter who you are or what you are, no matter how much money you have or how beautiful you think you are, there is going to come a time when it's just you and God."

Her family and friends reminded her that she had a purpose on earth before she could leave. In fact, Rosensteele and Darryl Taylor were at her side as she awoke from surgery. Since her sisters were unable to come take care of Franks, coworker Iverne Russell volunteered to sit with her during the chemo sessions and drive her to doctors' appointments. "I barely knew her," Franks admits. "God just sends me the right people at the right time."

The mixture of physical pain and the emotional pain of being unable to give birth continued to depress her during her recovery and eventual chemotherapy. But, as Rosensteele says, those around Franks never know she's in pain. "When she was in the hospital, I would go visit and the conversation would turn to work," he says of her zest for life. "By the end of the conversation, she was making me feel better."

King always has seen her niece as a beacon of light. She reminded Franks of her "miraculous" turnaround as a toddler during her recovery from the last operation. "God had his hands on you from the beginning," Franks says her aunt told her. "When you were little, they cut you in half to remove that kidney. I can remember going to see you. You were in this big incubator. You had tubes everywhere. There were medicines and machines. It was the most horrible thing I had ever seen in my life. But you pulled through; that was the most amazing thing. You touched me that day, and every time I get depressed, I think about you."

Franks doesn't think of herself as an inspiration. Instead she looks to the women who have battled just as much or more than she has. While walking her first Komen Indianapolis Race for the Cure¨ this year, she was overwhelmed by the fact that every one of the thousands of participants was a breast cancer survivor or knew someone with breast cancer. "It just really registered with me that this disease is so common," says Franks, whose cancer is in remission, although her hands, legs and feet are still numb.

Cancer may be common, but "We see a patient like her (only) every three or four years," says White. "Her faith and family kept her strong."

The people who inspire Franks come in all forms. While she was feeling down during a chemo session, she saw a little girl, outfitted in a dress and a matching scarf to cover her bald head, playing and singing in the hallway. Franks realized her life wasn't as bad as she thought it was.

"It (the cancer) puts life into perspective," she explains, admitting to being more temperate and grateful for people since the illnesses. She says the little things don't bother her anymore - but then neither do the big things, now. There's a reason she smiles so much. She's happy to be alive.