i love the way the media is tap-dancing around the new standards for young woman and mammograms - and even self-exams. everyone (including normally rational women on national public radio affiliates) are wigging out. the doctors and researchers are struggling to articulate the issues, because the truth ain't pretty.
here are a few thoughts from my non-medically trained brain:
1. mammograms can CAUSE breast cancer. it's xray, folks. but we can't say THAT because then women who really need mammograms will be too afraid to get them. too many mammograms is not a good thing. one every other year or when you find something weird is OK. just like it's okay to have your chest x-rayed if you have pneumonia, but you shouldn't get annual chest xrays just to see how your ribcage looks.
2. self-exams (aka "early detection is key") don't really solve anything, because by the time you feel a real, genuine lump, you'd probably find it anyway without the shower guide. and the self-exams cause much hand-wringing and drama because the vast majority of weird boob related stuff ain't cancer.
3. (here's the kicker): CANCER GROWS TOO FAST IN YOUNG WOMEN TO BE CAUGHT BY A MAMMOGRAM. seriously, folks. with a pre-menopausal breast tumor, there's no time to waste. in my situation, the mammogram at 33 actually gave me a false sense of security. i had a completely clean mammogram in march 06, and a 4cm tumor by october 06.
now, if i had KNOWN i was brca1 positive in march 06, perhaps i wouldn't have assumed everything was okay. i didn't know, and i wasn't okay. but this post isn't about brca1 patents, it's about mammograms.
and everyone needs to chill the fuck out. if you have a family history, or if you have a really weird lump, they will let you have a mammogram! no one is banning young women from these important exams if warranted.
peace out.
p.s. i sincerely hope that this new revelation puts an end to the "feel your boobies" tshirt line and other pseudo-pornographic awareness campaigns.
that is all.
i accidentally flew delta last week. the whole fucking plane was pink. the flight attendants wore pink ribbon t-shirts, the fucking sky mall magazine was pink, the pilots wore pink ribbons, and they sold "pink lemonade" for 2 bucks a pop. pink pink pink pink. my tumor was black, black, black gray. i'm so sick of pink.
first, i thought this was a satirical onion piece. i'm afraid not. LAT, have you no shame? have you no taste? you really find this shit progressive?
Breast cancer ads use lechery for good
SOME GEMS:
"The latest and greatest is a spot called "Save the Boobs," from the Rethink Breast Cancer charity, in which a voluptuous young woman in a white bikini walks into a pool party scene. Strip-club music kicks in and the camera slow-mo's her fleshy assets while the partygoers attempt to pick their jaws up off the ground."
"Over a montage of women cupping their hands over and under their right breasts, we hear their voices reciting, "I pledge allegiance to my girls, to my chi-chis, to my hooters, to my ta-tas, to my gazongas. . . ."
the IWF is running an anti-health care reform commercial (on the hallmark channel -- don't ask) - which features a "breast cancer survivor" (wearing a pink shirt) talking about how she would have DIED under government-run health care. she also attempts to terrify the viewer by employing hyperbolic tactics, such as "if you find a lump, you might have to wait MONTHS for treatment".
i threw up in my mouth just a little bit, but now i think i need to destroy something.
this is the same IWF that referred to VAWA as "feminist pork".
indian culture is contributing to high rates of death from breast cancer! yet another reason to continue the productive and humane efforts to destroy and/or assimilate tribal cultures. this is so asinine i don't know where to begin.
look, i get it -- when your tribal word for cancer can be translated as "the sore that never heals" - then maybe you have a different worldview about cancer than your "anglo" sisters. (as an aside, are we assuming that the white world has it all figured out and most people don't automatically link cancer to a death sentence??)
this way of approaching the problem, however, is ludicrous.
why not focus on public health outreach and education rather than blame cultural practices or values? is a native woman who finds a lump going to feel comforted by the fact that a bunch of non-native oncologists have decided it's her CULTURE that is the problem?
try again, my friends.
this evening, a prime-time network televised dance competition included a 90-second "breast cancer" dance (complete with female dancer in head scarf) to -- get this - "This Woman's Work" (yeah, the c-section song from she's having a baby)-- and made me TRULY sob. genuine, heaving, sniffling, snot-flying sobbing.
i'm not kidding.
so either --
a) i'm tripping
or
b) it was actually really fucking good
i'm also reflecting a bit on how my bitterness, self-effacing coping mechanism means that when something DOES get to me - and it really, really did tonight -- then my ability to engage in full-on pink ribbony gushing -- is to the OTHER extreme. even if for just one hour a year.
it was probably lame (i don't even want to watch a re-run) but it got me in some "vulnerable" space.
also, i have to stop watching television. i have shit to do.
i don't mourn pedophiles. sorry.
