The Nerve...

This week’s readings were very eye opening as they gave me a personal account of someone dealing with breast cancer; an experience I can not even begin to imagine. My best friend’s mother was diagnosed with breast cancer shortly after our graduation from high school. I remember her trying her best to hide her pain from us so that we could concentrate on our studies, but there came a time when she couldn’t hide it anymore because she needed our help. There were some days when my best friend wasn’t able to take off from work to take her mom to her doctor’s appointments, that’s where I would fill in and take her spot. I know this doesn’t have anything to do with the specific readings, but I felt it necessary to share that I, like I’m sure many people, have been very close to someone that has had to cope with breast cancer.


In the article “Rejected Body” author Susan Wendell really dissected the ideas behind disabilities. What really caught my attention was that a lot of the disabilities people have to deal with are caused by the carelessness of the humans on this planet. It baffles me how we then have the nerve to look at them in fright or disgust when it is the pollution from our cars that potentially made their disability possible. The other short article by Audre Lorde to me served as the emotion behind the trauma of dealing with breast cancer. For those of us that have not experienced it, gave us a window to feel what she might have been feeling to a certain degree.


After reading “The Cancer Journals” I was first extremely upset with the way Audre Lorde was treated while in the hospital. The option (and the word option is important) to wear a lambswool puff after a mastectomy is up the woman. A breast cancer survivor should not be expected to wear it if she chooses not to, nor should she be pressured into having surgery to recreate her breast. Moreover, she should definitely not be chastised for her decision to reject those methods. Audre Lorde isn’t saying that those methods are bad and that as a woman people should reject those methods, she’s simply saying that it should be a choice left up to the woman and that the woman should be given enough time to evaluate what has just happened to her before her doctor floods her with information. Office moral or getting fired from her job should be the last thing in a survivors mind. Lorde did raise my spirits a bit in her decision to DO WHAT WAS BEST FOR HER! Her refusal to conform to societies standards because her feminity was not defined by her breasts was very empowering for me and I haven’t even had to go through what she has.