A Burst of Light

When Reading "A Burst of Light:Living With Cancer" written by Audre Lorde gave me an insight to the experiences that women living with cancer truly experience.  Cancer is an overwhelmingly real condition in our society, that many people face but few ever understand the pain they experience personally.  Reading about Lordes' personal experiences made the cancer experience real compared to being learned about on the surface.  For someone to describe the feelings of them preparing for death and just holding on is remarkable.  I've never thought about what I want to do with the rest of my life and how I want to spend the remainder of my time when death is on the line.  Living each day as your last truly made sense when I read this article.  The honesty expressed in the article allowed the reader to have a genuine experience to learn about cancer patients and what they have to face more than the superficial physical changes.  

I've personally been lucky to not have any of my immediate family affected by cancer, but my "aunt" who is the surrogate mother of my cousin was recently diagnosed with breast cancer.  My little cousin who is only 3 watched her "birth" mother in the process of her having her breasts altered and loss of hair.  Although this is the process for any cancer patient, I was very aware of how my cousin handled the situation.  There were communication barriers, because its hard to explain to a child why her mom is constantly in the hospital and why she looks different than other mommies.  But honesty was the best policy in the situation.  Hiding the fact that her mom was sick would only make the issue harder in the long run.  This reminded me of the issue with intersex children and parents telling them of their "condition" while they are young.  Although it was a struggle for my cousins mom to be in and out of the hospital I believe it was a blessing in disguise.  Given that my cousin had two mommies, it was an opportunity for the surrogate mother and second mom to relate on a more personal level.  The struggles and the concern not even for the mom with cancer, but my little cousin put life into perspective.  Making decisions to cherish the time that may have only been left was all focused on the little girl.

This article gave an opportunity for the reader to see Lorde's personality and her emotions while she was facing a life-changing issue. It taught me to appreciate life and anything I can do to protect my body for the temple it truly is.