October 12, 2015

Thoughts on losing my last shred of dignity during breast cancer treatment and the Mardi Gras beads I earned along the way.

I think every woman who has given birth to a child feels like the process of growing, birthing and breastfeeding a brand new tiny human takes away just about every shred of dignity that she has. Like many moms, after getting two kiddos through babyhood, my body rarely felt like it was my own, and it certainly didn't feel nearly as sacred as it had pre-baby.

When my second little guy hopped on the bus to head to kindergarten, I thought I was LIVING. THE. DREAM. Two kids in elementary school and I was planning on using that degree I’d earned to get a paying gig. After they were all settled in at school. Or definitely by the new year. Definitely Instead, that October, I went from living the dream to living a strange nightmare. While everyone else was “thinking pink,” I was screaming at it. Diagnosed with early stage but very aggressive breast cancer, I discovered that I did, in fact, have some dignity left to lose after those babies were weaned.

read the article at https://www.curetoday.com/community/jamie-holloway/2015/10/the-indignity-of-breast-cancer