"Because I can." Dee Dee Lennon's Story

Enjoying the Little Things Above, Dee Dee looks through the hundreds of cards she received during her treatment for breast cancer.   Now retired from performing, Dee Dee volunteers for St. John’s and other organizations to raise awareness about breast cancer and other women’s health issues. She has served as a co-host for St. John’s Totally Healthy Woman Retreat for four consecutive years. “I was always one of four performers, so for me to get up and speak by myself was hard. But it’s important to give back. The staff at St. John’s guided my family and I through a very difficult time,” she says. Eleven years cancer-free, Dee Dee focuses on staying healthy and enjoying the “little things.” She was deemed cancer-free Aug. 31, 1994, a day she now celebrates annually with her family. “Time is precious – I don’t want to waste a minute,” she says.

It takes a certain kind of woman to feel joy when she sees her grandchildren’s dirty little hands coming at her to give her a hug.

“So what if they play in the dirt? I enjoy it. I kiss them, let the dirt get on me … because I can,” Dee Dee Lennon explains.

Dianne “Dee Dee” Lennon Gass is the oldest of 11 children born into a showbiz family known primarily for the sister act she and sisters Kathy, Vickie and Janet first performed 50 years ago on the Lawrence Welk television show.

The Lennon Sisters reunited onstage in 1994 at Branson’s Lawrence Welk Champagne Theater at the Welk Resort. Just months after moving to Branson to sing with her sisters again, Dee Dee was diagnosed with breast cancer after a mammogram at St. John’s Breast Center.

Dee Dee knew she had calcifications in her breast when she moved to Branson. Her physicians back in California were checking her every four months and had advised her to have one more mammogram before resuming her yearly mammogram schedule.

She met St. John’s cardiologist Phillip Carr, M.D., one day at the golf course and asked his advice.
“My doctor in California had told me to go to a women’s breast center, not just a hospital that performs mammograms. I asked Phil where the nearest one was and he said St. John’s had a great breast center,” Dee Dee said in 1998.

Concerned after the diagnosis, Dee Dee’s family tried to talk her into returning to California for treatment, but she disagreed.

“I felt very comfortable … I wasn’t just a number, I was a person. I had faith in these doctors,” she said.

At St. John’s, Dee Dee was treated by a Breast Center team comprised of breast-imaging radiologist and St. John’s Breast Center medical director J. Leon Gregston, M.D.; surgeon Joni Scott, M.D.; plastic surgeon Rodney Geter, M.D.; and oncologist Wendell Goodwin, M.D.

After her mastectomy and chemotherapy, Dee Dee resumed performing roughly two shows a day at the Lawrence Welk Champagne Theater. She hid her drains and tubes under her sparkly Bob Mackie gowns during what she describes as the scariest time in her life. She refused to let her diagnosis and treatment slow her down.

Now a full-time grandma after retiring from performing three years ago, Dee Dee spends most of her time with husband Dick Gass and their children and grandchildren, who also call Branson home.
“Because my life seemed to come to a sudden stand-still after being diagnosed, I appreciate each precious moment now,” Dee Dee says. “I was given a second chance. I love to hold my husband’s hand each morning as we take our daily two-mile walk. I enjoy hugs and kisses from my grandchildren and I drop everything when I hear their little footsteps coming through the front door.”