Funny Breast Cancer T Shirt
Hey kids, it’s National Breast Cancer Awareness Month, so why not have some fun with it?
A little background on why this cause is near and dear to my heart: As I’ve written before, my precious Mom got breast cancer when I was ohhhh, about 11 or 12 years old.
We were newly living in New Orleans, having been uprooted from the only home we’d ever known in small town Hays, Kansas. My Mama hauled me and my two sisters Laura and Sierra down there to be with her high school sweetheart Edmund after my parents got divorced.
This was good for my Mom romantically, but horrible for us girls, our Dad vanished from our lives after that for years and Edmund was a stranger to us, he was just not our Dad, ya know?
Plus we had to assimilate to new schools and find new friends and navigate our new, very weird and different environment (a big city, Southern accents!) as young girls trying to find our coltish sea legs in the world.
If we had lost our mom in the midst of all that, well I just don’t know. I honestly think with my sensitivity and all of the other stuff I’ve had to overcome in my life since then that I may not have lived this long, if we’d lost her at that age. It was such a formative time for a young girl’s psyche.
Andy Warhol would be proud.
My Mom was very stoic about the whole thing, I don’t even remember her crying or breaking down at all.
Edmund stood by her side, she got radiation and a mastectomy, and praise God she’s ALIVE and healthy today.
That experience made both me and my two sisters worry that we could get it because of the genetic link and not to say that we wouldn’t be shocked and horrified if we were diagnosed, but I don’t think any of us would be totally surprised.
For my part, I’ve gone through phases where I obsessively checked my boobs with a self exam every month and even wrote down my findings of any potentially lumps and bumps (I don’t really have lumps and bumps, I think I was feeling muscle tissue).
When I was 28 I really did get a lump that my Gyno MISSED- I found it myself! Scary…
I had to go to a mean women at the hospital for a mammogram at that young age, followed by a sonogram. It turned out to be a blocked milk duct that became unblocked when I breast fed my baby. Bex sucked it out. Phew!
Exactly.
On the flip side of the obsessive me, I also have gone through periods when I avoided breast exams completely because I didn’t want to find bad news. I was too busy. I had enough day to day problems, I didn’t have time for cancer.
This reasoning is of course, crazy, but point is, I understand why some women want to stick their head in the sand and not know.
Cute.
DON’T DO THAT! Check yer boobies, ladies. Early detection is at your fingertips.
I like to do it in the shower when I’m soaped up, or using lotion works well, too.
Not trying to sound sexual here, but sure, have your husband or a friend do it, too! We love our tits and we want to keep them, man.
I also get a yearly mammogram, and I had the saliva swab test for that breast cancer gene and I don’t have it.
That’s lucky because God knows with all of the vodka I drank, I probably raised my risk factors.
However, I have pretty regularly exercised and eaten fairly healthy and I don’t smoke- and those things can lower your risk, so who knows? I’m quite fond of my boobs and I intend to keep them.
The important thing with all cancers is early detection, because you are awesome and we need you here on this planet.
Girls rule.
And F*ck cancer. Fight like a girl!
XOXO-
~ Heidi
I just found out 3 days ago that my mom has breast cancer. So far we’re feeling lucky because its DCIS in stage zero. She tried to comfort me by letting me know that her doctor told her he wished he could tell all his patients what he had to tell her but it just didn’t. Well, I guess it did but that knowledge didn’t take away the stark awareness I just sunk my teeth deep into that my mom even if not by this cancer is someday going to die. Not an easy pill to swallow no matter the age. And of course we all know our parents will be going before us if nature dictates as intended but I guess it just never fully registered until now.
Very glad your mumma lived to tell about it, and loving your easy breezy take on bringing awareness. Very cool.
http://www.blogger.com/profile/06095588972456545064
Oh Sass, I’m so sorry to hear that! I’m happy to hear it’s at an early stage, but still, so scary. I really, really fear losing my Mom someday- I get it. I never want to know what that feels like, not at 90.
I just adore you! Thanks for this post! A lady whom I claim as my second mom just has a double mastectomy last week AFTER having radiation to downsize the cancer. They couldn’t do the surgery without the 6 months of Chemo first. Now she must have more Chemo before getting her “girls” replaced. When she was in the hospital last week, we kinda joked about her new boobies and what “type” she was going to get. I have to be honest though. This is the bravest woman I have ever seen. I absolutely adore her and it broke my heart to see her laying in that hospital bed so vulnerable looking.
She is a fighter and she will be fine. Her laughter is contagious (even after having her boobs removed.) So, so strong.
I am totally taking her the first shirt on your page though when she gets her new boobies
She will get a kick out of that one. As a matter of fact I may get it for anyone that I know that has new boobies because theirs “tried to kill them”
http://serenefranklin.blogspot.com
If you take your friend the shirt that will be so awesome! I just met a woman last night who just finished her radiation therapy for weeks upon weeks that she had to work full time through, it was a breast cancer recurrence of one she had 15 years ago. She’ll be fine, but it reminded me that at my age I have a lot of years to watch out for this, we have to be vigilant. Outside of something happening to my child, chemo is one of my worst fears- your friend sounds so strong and brave and I know she’s gonna make it!
I do not have the slightest doubt that she will!
http://serenefranklin.blogspot.com
I found your blog looking for cute t-shirts. I am 6 months post-bilateral mastectomy and tram flap reconstruction. Just wrote a similar post myself. Checking the boobies and getting your yearly mammogram is so very much easier than the alternative! (I wear my “Of course they’re fake” t-shirt proudly, loving the looks on people’s faces when they “get” it!)
http://iwantbacksies.blogspot.com/
Dyanne,
I’m so glad you’re okay! It’s a journey none of us want to take (and I can’t pretend to understand what it’s like to go through that), but I’m so glad to know that if I do, there are strong brave women like you who I can look to for inspiration! Thank you.