Tetons - Great and Small


October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month. With two sisters, four daughters, one step-daughter and two granddaughters (a third due in January), not to mention my Mom and Mother-in-Love, I am surrounded by wonderful women without leaving home! Needless to say, the topic of mammaries comes up often.

All kidding aside, I have always talked frankly with my girls about caring for their bodies. This included self breast exams and, once they got to the age, yearly mammograms. We have all been blessed. Too many of our loved ones and acquaintances have not been as lucky.



Sunday at church we were asked to pray for a young mother of four who just found out she has aggressive breast cancer. It breaks my heart every time I hear about another woman struggling to survive this disease. Martha Weinman Lear wrote in Heartsounds, "Women agonize...over cancer; we take as a personal threat the lump in every friend's breast." http://www.amazon.com/Heartsounds-Martha-weinman-lear/dp/0671243292

In 50 odd years of life, I have agonized too many times. Too often I have been told, "I really didn't think it as anything," or "Well, you know how it is, you get busy and the next thing you know it's been a couple of years since your last test." Unfortunately, the women that made those comments are no longer alive.

If this blog does nothing else, may it save one life. If you are reading this, and have not had your yearly mammogram, pick up the phone and make your appointment. Do not wait! Give yourself monthly self breast exams. If you are not sure how to do them, ask your doctor, best friend, mother, sister, or someone you trust how to feel for lumps or changes in the breast tissue. (Sometimes you do not have lumps, you have thickening.) If you are concerned, GO TO THE DOCTOR! Do not put it off!

The following links offer a wealth of information:

http://ww5.komen.org/home/


http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/types/breast


Click on this link and then click to help woman in need receive mammograms (you can do this daily): http://www.thebreastcancersite.com/clickToGive/home.faces?siteId=2

We are all connected, all in this journey together. Take time to take care of yourself. There are too many of us on this journey that need the special "you" that you bring to the world.

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