Changing Narratives

For the longest time October would arrive with difficult memories of my father's death. When I was 24 he went into the hospital with severe headaches and then died within three weeks of small cell lung cancer that had metastasized to his brain. He was 52.  My family's shock and grief felt so disabling I wondered how we would find our way again, collectively and individually.

But you do, because that is how love works through time.

The Perfect Purple

Eventually October reclaimed its spot as one of the best times of the year - sparkling fresh air, cider, cinnamon, and little goblins dressed in sheets coming up the driveway with flashlights and parents in tow.  Even in l998 October was still a month. That year it marked the beginning of my second course of chemotherapy, a milestone of sorts in my own cancer narrative.  October marked the first (of two) times I particiatped in a Komen walk in an outrageously awesome t-shirt my beautiful sister produced just for the event.  The shirt was my favorite color - purple.  She had enough made so I could give them to the special men and women who'd done so much for all of us during treatment.

That's how love through time works.

And this year October changes again.  All of us who care and write about lives affected by cancer sense a shift.  Conversations about breast cancer are changing, thanks to the work of writers and truth tellers who speak honestly about their experience with breast cancer.  While the changing conversation isn't fast enough to dampen the suffering in our midst we keep at it, louder and louder, because we can.   And we must.  I just realized yesterday (ah, some of us are slow) that those learning about breast cancer from their own diagnosis or that of a friend come into the experience bombarded with the pink images it took many of us years to deconstruct.  Gayle Sulik, Ph.D., author of  Pink Ribbon Blues, dedicated ten years of research, interviewing and writing to become an "overnight" success and change agent in breast cancer culture. We are all the wiser to remember the time it takes and collective work necessary to approach a tipping point.

A debt of gratitude to all of you truth-tellers for your honesty and advocacy.

jms

And a huge thank you to Liz Szabo, for the wonderful spotlight she provided to the conversations we're changing through #BCSM.  Her write-up, with video: "Breast cancer survivor group is a social movement."

#BCSM co-moderators Deanna Attai, MD, Alicia Staley and I are incredibly honoroed.  If you haven't checked Liz's other articles on her breast cancer and health issues please do so.  Just this month alone has covered inflammatory breast cancer, breast cancer and pregnancy and ways to help breast cancer survivors in way that is informative, real, and immediate.  I think she's one of a kind.

Also thanks to Liz Scherer (it's a Liz day!) for the awesome shout on her blog FLASHFREE: It's Not Your Momma's Menopause in:  Hold Your Breasts; it's Breast Cancer Awareness Month.'

While I'm on Liz movement...add in:)