Saturday, October 11, 2008

Going Pink for October

If you will notice, we have gone pink for October. When I saw the button on a fellow blogger’s site, I knew that we had to join in. Unfortunately, too many friends of mine have dealt with cancer, not just breast cancer, but all different types. In fact in 2001, I lost my mother to esophageal cancer. We have been blessed that most of the other women have won the battle, but our friend Mary succumbed to breast cancer leaving her five homeschooled children without a mother. And about a week ago, a dear friend of ours was diagnosed with breast cancer, so going pink could not be any more apropos.

This year was actually my first mammogram. I was very nervous about the whole idea. It was just supposed to be to gather a baseline to compare all future mammograms to, but then I got the note that what they found was questionable and I would have to go for a second mammogram. It wasn’t anything conclusive, just questionable. I wondered if I was going to be the next in a list of too many women friends that have battled for their life. Very fortunately for me, I had the follow up mammogram about a week ago and have received the all clear. But this will be the beginning of annual breath holding. Women should have their baseline mammogram taken between 35-40 years old and then annually thereafter.

For all those friends that have battle breast cancer, we need to spread the word, educate woman (and men), and raise money for research to irradiate this disease forever.

Have you had your mammogram this year?

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