Be All You Can Be... in the Army of Women

October is breast cancer awareness month in the USA, as I'm sure all of you know. It's almost impossible these days to not be bombarded by pink everywhere you go!

The success of the breast cancer awareness movement in the last 20 years or so has been truly remarkable and inspiring (if a little envy-inducing for those of us who advocate primarily for another type of cancer). Huge scientific progress has been made thanks to the hundreds of millions of dollars (if not more) that have been raised by various breast cancer organizations, like Susan G. Komen for the Cure and the Avon Foundation.

There is a new initiative on the breast cancer scene this year, and it's a revolutionary one! The Army of Women, a joint initiative of the Avon Foundation and the Dr. Susan Love Research Foundation, has set a goal of recruiting one MILLION healthy women to volunteer for breast cancer prevention research studies. The Army of Women launch was recently announced on the Today Show (click here to see!).

Leave it to women to take such an incredibly proactive approach in helping to eradicate this devastating disease. Very cool.

For more information, and to join the Army of Women, click here.

You go girls!

Good News for Applegate

Great news! Christina Applegate has been pronounced cancer-free after undergoing a double mastectomy. Wow.

I have read a lot about mastectomies and other breast cancer treatments, between Bathsheba's Breast and The Secret History of the War on Cancer (which I am slowly but surely plowing through, I promise!). Needless to say, the various surgeries have come a long way, as has a woman's right and ability to choose how far to go with her treatment. Applegate's mother is a long-term breast cancer survivor who had a recurrence many years after having a single mastectomy. So Applegate's attitude was to take no chances on a recurrence. As she says, "I just wanted to kind of be rid of this whole thing for me. This was the choice that I made, and it was a tough one."

I applaud Applegate's proactive approach to her treatment and I am thrilled that the outcome is freedom from cancer. She also says she will start raising money for cancer research (catch her appearance on SU2C!), MRIs (the test that saved her life), and gene testing (she has the breast cancer gene, BRCA1).

Perhaps best of all, Applegate is raising awareness about breast cancer and cancer in general by speaking out. The breast cancer movement has been able to move into mainstream consciousness thanks to fearless women like Applegate, who will talk about their breast cancer candidly and publicly. I hope survivors of other cancers that still have stigmas attached to them (HELLO! Aren't butts just as cute as breasts? Come on, colon cancer survivors! Put the word out there!) will follow the example of these incredible women.

Share your thoughts about Applegate's cancer journey in the comment section!

To read the complete ABC News article and watch the video of Applegate's interview, click here.

Open Letter: Is It Appropriate?

Breast cancer survivor Suzanne Somers has written an open letter to Christina Applegate, published on People.com. I'm a little dubious about this, as "Thighmaster" Somers clearly likes media attention... but she's a cancer survivor, she's been married for 31 years, and she has built a multi-million dollar empire in addition to her decades-long career as a television actress, so I suppose I can't knock her too badly. Plus, there are some good, positive thoughts here:

Dear Christina,

Cancer is scary, and lonely. You can't ask anyone to make decisions for you because it's just too heavy. There is a lot of 'rush to treatment,' when what you really need is time to research and think about how you want to approach this. Take your time Christina, there is no rush. Take your time and think it through. Use your cancer to learn and grow and as a force to work for you. You might choose to take an alternative approach. There are more options than the ones presented to you in the oncologist's office. You will make it. The success and drive you have had in your career will be the same strengths you will use to win over this nasty disease. And I am here if you want to talk to someone who was 'there.'

Sincerely,
Suzanne Somers

A nice gesture, I guess. But is this really appropriate, or is it just to get a little press? I am going to choose to believe that it's a kind, genuine gesture meant to give support from a breast cancer survivor to a newly diagnosed patient. Perhaps this letter will give hope to others as well. So... okay.

Now back to the Olympics!

Cancer Nerd Kudos to Applegate

I was so sad to hear of Christina Applegate's breast cancer diagnosis. The announcement came only five days after another, more positive cancer-related announcement: her participation in the Stand Up to Cancer telecast on September 5. But perhaps the best news of all is that Applegate still plans to participate in the show.

Phew! That was a lot of links there.

I have always loved Christina Applegate. I never really got into "Married With Children" but I always thought she was beautiful, and I was always impressed that she never fell prey to the perils of Hollywood fame. She just seems very down-to-earth. And she is genuinely talented! They don't show "Samantha Who?" here in the UK but it looks supercute and I'm happy she's had this re-boost to her career.

I'm happier, of course, that her diagnosis is an early and positive one, and that she is expected to make a full recovery. And I'm really glad that she will still appear on the SU2C telethon. She will be getting a lot more attention than she would have otherwise, so kudos to her for having the courage to stand as a survivor mere weeks after her diagnosis.

You go girl!

More Boobs! (A Book Review: Part II)

Now that I have slept on Bathsheba's Breast - or, well, on my thoughts about this book, I mean - I have come to the conclusion that, although it is not an easy read, this is a truly remarkable book. And I might be a little oversensitive because a) I am a woman with breasts, and b) I take my cancer reading very personally. So there. I admit it.

When I go back through the notes I took on each chapter of this book and attempt to digest everything I learned, I am almost overwhelmed with knowledge and awareness. I feel that now I have a solid knowledge of the history of this disease and also an awareness of the bigger picture: how breast cancer has evolved from being the original cancer, the only one known for generations because it could be seen without an x-ray or an autopsy, to setting the standard for cancer research, treatment, awareness, and advocacy. Olson covers this evolution in depth, and although he chronologically bounces around a bit, his efforts are fairly extraordinary.

In an attempt to be fairly concise... here are some very valuable things I learned from this book (with links to Wikipedia if you're interested):

• Breast cancer has taken the lives of countless notable women, from Theodora (wife of Justinian I) to Adolf Hitler's mom to Linda McCartney.
• Hippocrates named cancer for "karkinos" or "crab" because tumors seemed to have tentacles that resembled crabs' legs.
• Mastectomies were being performed in Germany as early as the 1600s! Yikes.
• And these surgeries were performed without anesthesia - that didn't come into the picture until 1846.
  
• William Steward Halsted invented the radical mastectomy (removal of breast, axillary bodes, both chest muscles in a single en bloc procedure - I didn't know what it was, either) in the 1880s. He was also a coke addict. Oops.
• By the mid-1950s, a variety of surgeries were being used on women, sometimes in succession, with each being more gruesome than the last. Needless to say, faith in doctors and science at this time was very, very high.
• Radiation also came into use in the 50s and 60s - but mortality rates for each of these treatments (radiation, radical surgery, lumpectomy, etc.) were similarly high.
• This is gross: due to the high mortality rates, every country except for the US opted for the less invasive treatments. American surgeons (most of whom were male) were the last to cling to the radical mastectomy.
• Luckily, the feminism movement gained momentum in the 60s, and empowered women were on a roll by the time Nixon announced the "War on Cancer" in 1971.
• Women like Shirley Temple Black, Happy Rockefeller, and Betty Ford started speaking out about their diagnoses in the 70s. Amazing and so brave.
• Rose Kushner was an incredible cancer advocate who took control of her diagnosis and treatment. Her courage paved the way for other women to have more control over their treatment options. Kushner was diagnosed in 1974 and died in 1990.
• Ruth Handler, the inventor of the Barbie doll, lost one breast to cancer in 1970, and the other in 1989. She started a breast prothesis company and was another incredible advocate.
• Breast cancer has been riddled with controversy for decades, but the disease has made its way into mainsteam consciousness, which ultimately bodes well for the cause.

Phew! And there is more where that came from. A highly recommended read indeed. I just hope that someday a book with this depth and detail will be written about colon cancer.