In your Facebook

So... I've been so out of the loop lately that I'm really just catching up on all the internet gossip. I'm sure by now you've all heard all the brouhaha about Facebook disallowing pictures of breastfeeding women as inappropriate and pornagraphic. Well, first let me say that I didn't even know what Facebook was before this and I did not use it. Second, there is nothing pornagraphic about a woman breastfeeding a child... except (and this is strickly my own personal view here) when said child is able to walk to school on his/her own).

That being said, and me being way past the breastfeeding years and also no longer in possession of my very own breasts (thank you very much), I would like to offer this larger than life photo of D nursing.

I like to call it BLOWING UP A BALLOON.

For shame Facebook! There is no shame in the natural function of a womans body feeding her child.

It's the begining and the end

We're starting Breast Cancer Awareness Month. In honor of that I'd like to direct you to this article at Parent Dish. Heather Craven and WhyMommy do a wonderful job of shining a light on our rarely seen Inflammatory Breast Cancer. I would only like to add that not only does a breast not have to have a lump to have cancer... but there also does not have to be skin changes to be Inflammatory Breast Cancer (IBC).

My IBC did not present as the picture in the article. Oh, one breast was grossly larger than the other, all right. However, it was NOT red. Nor was the skin thickened or orange peely, nor itchy. In fact, I had no skin changes whatsoever until the evening before my first chemo treatment (3.5 months after I first noticed a hardness in the center of my breast). Even then my breast was only the slightest bit pink - not even as pink as when I leave a hot shower.

My advise to any woman is simply this: If there are any changes in your breast whatsoever - particularly if it is in one breast and not both - see your doctor.

Or... If you...

• feel a certain heaviness that was not there before
• feel small shooting pains in one breast on a regular basis
• one breast seems to be growing larger
• there is unexplained tenderness in your underarm or across the top of your chest

Or, if you are nursing and...

• your child suddenly stops nursing on one breast for an extended period with no explaination
• you feel engorged constantly - even after pumping or nursing
• your breast is red and angry looking without any pain

Any and all of these symptoms are not normal. An unnaturally high number of IBC diagnosis' are of women who are pregnant or breastfeeding.

*******

Today is also the end of the Federal Government's Fiscal Year. Also known as The Day Imstell Gets Her Life Back. Woohoo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Unplanned Hiatus...

It's the End of the Federal Fiscal Year... I didn't realize I would be so busy for so long that I'd be unable to update. The good news is it all ends on Friday...

In the meantime, please go visit Sarah over at The Killer Boob. She's having her v-e-r-y long DIEP flap breast reconstruction surgery today in Belgium. Please send all your positive thoughts, prayers and healing energy her way.

Crazy Sexy Wheatgrass

So... I finally watched it. Between kids, End of Fiscal Year at work, the beginning of the school year and just plain ole living I've been having a hard time watching the news let alone anything else. Thank the good Lord for TiVo. It is proof He loves us, is it not...

Well, Crazy Sexy Cancer was not what I expected. But I really liked it. I'm not sure exactly what I expected, actually. Maybe I expected more gloom & doom. More glorification of the struggle. What I got was reality. The good days when you feel like you can take on the Big Bad Cancer Monster and WILL NOT LET IT TAKE YOUR LIFE SO THERE AND GO TO HELL BY THE WAY. And the bad days when you don't even get out of bed before you're fighting back the tears and just know that if someone, anyone looks at you sideways you'll melt into a formless puddle of gel and be unable to function.

Kris Carr showed admirably that life is all about the living and that cancer part of that living. The lives she chose to highlight were exemplary. They were all women who have chosen to continue living beyond their diagnosis of whatever cancer has besieged them. There was a great message of hope in Kris' film. And also of love.

The finding of love and getting married is, I feel, a supreme act of faith and hope. I'm sure all of us who have been diagnosed have felt that same overwhelming sense of being a burden. An emotional burden on our families. A possible financial burden on our husbands. A psychological & potential physical burden on our children. A burden none of them signed up for. Would they have signed up for it had they known the future? We'll never know. But Kris Carr knows. What a lucky woman.

WhyMommy asked me if I found it hard to watch. Not at all. Although, I did wonder at what kind of life one must have to be able to make curing yourself a full-time job. I actually have to work for a living. Otherwise, Kris and I seem to have found the same summit from which to view the world. "Cancer is a catalyst." she said. I couldn't agree more.

Cancer helped me see that I had certainly better stop living my life for "tomorrow" because it just may not be there. But today is. So enjoy it here and now. I do things that I would have been frightened to do pre-cancer. I did a zip-line tour through the Mexican Rain Forest. I stepped off that platform without a second thought and never looked back. I'm a bit afraid of heights - always have been. Not really anymore. I did a giant half pipe waterslide with my son that I NEVER would have gone on in my other life. But there are lots of ways to die & I'm fairly sure mine doesn't involve an inner tube.

Sarah from Killer Boob has asked if Crazy Sexy Cancer is worth the watch. Well, I think it is. It might be a bit harder to watch if you are in active treatment at the moment. But I feel it's important to see the whole picture. To see that life goes on. Love goes on. Even with metastatic disease it goes on. Plus, there's a lot of loonies out there. And you can stick wheat grass up your bum.