LOS ANGELES - First, there was the lime green monkey. Then came the T-shirt, the teddy bear, the painting, the license plate and other gifts, all of which Melissa Etheridge graciously accepted from fans and piled before the drum kit, like some sort of altar.

Before her battle with breast cancer, Etheridge was adored by her fans - for her impassioned blues rock and her coming-out as a lesbian midcareer. She seems even more cherished by them now.

During a recent local concert, the audience was an ocean of raised arms and swaying bodies as Etheridge tore into songs off her newly released greatest-hits album and bantered with the XX- and XY-chromosome couples, alternating between lighthearted mentions of her cancer experience and the macho swaggering that fans have always loved.

If you didn't know that Etheridge had spent a portion of the last year bedridden and immobile, you wouldn't have known from her glowing skin and voice, which is as strong and clear as ever. Speaking in her Hidden Hills, Calif., home a few days before the show, Etheridge said her energy returned to 100 percent only in early October. That's one year after she found a 4-centimeter lump in her left breast while on tour.

Physically, all that remains of that lump these days are the scars. Pulling down the neck of her loose-fitting orange T-shirt, Etheridge showed the thin, pink line running across her chest toward her armpit. That one - from the lumpectomy - doesn't bother her so much.

"The scar from where they put the portacatheter in," she said, revealing a darker red, raised circle over her right breast, "that scar - I would curse it." That's where the chemo went in - five times in two months - pumping the near-toxic medicine directly into her heart and throughout her body. That's how she spent the last two months of 2004 - in pain.

"I wasn't able to watch television because it hurt. Music, sound hurt. You can smell everything, so anything anyone's eating makes you completely sick," said Etheridge, 44.

"I was completely still. Us, who live our lives so busy with every day planned, to come to a complete standstill was something I'd never done before," she added. "Day after day, I was lying in bed with nothing but my head and my thoughts."

Retreating into her mind to escape the pain of her body, she took a long, hard look at her life and her career. It wasn't nearly as glamorous as it looked from the outside. Where the public saw a lighthearted and fearless performer with a long and enviable career, she saw a workaholic whose self-worth fluctuated with media attention, radio airplay and record sales. Where the public saw a woman comfortable with her sexuality and appearance, she saw body-image issues, poor eating habits and Hollywood pressures to be thin.

"I had a lot of self-loathing," Etheridge said. "I've been self-sustained since I was 11. I've always been the one making the money, and to be flat on my back and ... so vulnerable and then be completely loved. To have my wife be there, 110 percent supportive. To have my children say, ‘It's OK, Mom.' To have the people that I work for say, ‘It's OK.' To have my fans go, ‘It's all right.' It's like, what was I afraid of? I'm going to get healthy now, and I'm not going to carry that baggage anymore."

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