“They told me breast cancer would make me stronger, but nobody warned me it could make me softer, too. Not weak-soft…sacred-soft. The kind of softness that wears silk robes, sets boundaries like a boss, and still shows up to fight for Black and Brown bodies in this messy political climate. My soft-girl era isn’t canceled, sis… it’s thriving.”
After I had my bilateral mastectomy in 2017, I decided on immediate DIEP flap reconstruction. During the process of explaining to me some intricacies of the surgery, my plastic surgeon mentioned that my nipples would always be at attention – um, excuse me?
Women of color are constantly being ignored and underrepresented in all industries and business is no different. This September, For The Breast of Us, focused on #BaddiesinBusiness.
Feelings are like footwear, you can decide on a daily basis which ones you choose to wear. You wouldn’t choose something wack to style yourself in so why would you choose negative self talk about your body? Choose to love your body, it loved you enough to keep you here.
Ever since the development of my breasts, my identity and self-worth have been attached to them.
My post-cancer body is a work in progress, both physically and mentally. I would even go so far as to say that the battle is more mentally.
I had become the patient; he became the caregiver. He saw me differently. Fragile. In pain. Suffering. All I wanted was to be loved in every way — to be a wife, a lover, a sexual being.
Doctors not LISTENING to what I want was genuinely frustrating — and being a doctor myself didn’t make me immune to the frustrations with our healthcare system.
What I put on my body is just as important as what I put inside my body.
A story of how health and fitness can still be healthful even after being diagnosed. Maintaining a healthy lifestyle is even more important during and after a diagnosis.
