Happy Birthday to Me

I'm celebrating my birthday--fifty-five--today in all the ways that make me feel happy and loved and grateful to my family and friends.  

Sex Matters

In my last post, I knocked breastcancer.org for their Victorian-age advice to breast cancer survivors who experience medically induced post-menopausal problems with sex, difficulties that many menopausal and post-menopausal women will deal with in varying degrees when their estrogen fuel tank is running on fumes.  But breastcancer.org added a new blog called Sex Matters by Dr. Michael Krychman, an GYN who specializes in the challenges of breast cancer survivorship.  Here's solid and savvy information.  It's about time.

Sex Matters
https://community.breastcancer.org/blog/category/sex-matters/

Things That Make You Go WTF?

So, I'm working on an article about breast cancer survivorship and sexuality, the inherent sexual problems which come from being hit by medical menopause at a hundred miles an hour, and I found this on www.breastcancer.org, titled Meeting Needs In Other Ways, which suggests how to pass your time if your sex life isn't firing:

*  Fantasy can enrich your life.  Countless women read to fill the vacuum (romance novels are enormously popular).
*  Join a book club, a church or synagogue, or a group that meets to discuss investments, movies, or local politics.

They also suggested shopping's retail therapy.  There's always shopping!

Now that we are surviving this evil disease, we need better information, better than try reading Fifty Shades of Gray, or empty your checking account at the mall, to manage the consequences of breast cancer's treatment.

See you at the WOMAN magazine booth at the October 18th STRIDE event!

Deb

Feminine Strength

Take a minute and check in with your body, your temple, the casa for your soul.  How does your body feel right now?  Strong?  How might it feel a few years from now?  What are you doing to keep your body strong, strong enough to do all of the things you want to do with your life, your one wild and precious life? - Mary Oliver's elegant verse.

Forget about what you weigh or how you think you look, and especially that quote by Wallis Simpson,  women can never be too rich or too thin.  No one even remembers her any more; they only remember her self-centered, narrow-minded view of her skin and bones life.

How do you feel in your body now?   How do you want to move through your life five years from now?  Ten years?  Twenty?  What kind of role model will you be for the young women in your life?

I wish I'd said some of these things to one of my favorite gal pals when she told me she'd gained too much weight.  I always think of the right words, what I should have said, on the way home or maybe as late as the next day.  She said she has gym equipment at home, but she doesn't use it.  She likes to eat.  She feels guilty about all of these things.

I said, "Try Jazzercise--it's so much fun," even though I knew I'd get the eye-roll.  Every time I say, Jazzercise, I get the you've-got-to-be-kidding-me look.  You'd think I'd said, "Try dancing naked at a strip club," which is probably a good workout, too.

Then she said, "I can't learn all of those dance moves," and I roll my eyes.  What I heard is, "I can't learn new things," which is a shitty thing to tell yourself.  New patterns and rhythms are good for your mind and music is good for your soul.

I'm not selling Jazzercise; I'm just saying find a fun way to stay fit and feel strong.

I'd rather be a strong women than a starve-myself-skinny bitch.  I like knowing my legs can kick me through the ocean on snorkel trips, and stride across Walmart's superstore in my real life.

So get out there and be strong.  Be a role model for everyone around you.  Oh, and have fun!

We're not going to be good girls and take our medicine anymore. Dr. Susan Love. Report card on what we need to cure our women..

http://blog.dslrf.org/?p=1771

(please click on link above)

"Wow!  You have pink hair!" 

"Is your pink hair real or fake?"

"You must be a rebel."

"Are you an artist?" 

These are some of the words people say to me about my hair.  A year ago, I dyed a small strip of my hair pink--scorching hot bubble gum pink--for Pink October.  I followed a prodding impulse to find a way to show that I am a member of the pink tribe.  I am a breast cancer survivor.  

Since I'd lost my hair during chemo, coloring a bit of it pink made sense to me.  I thought it might open the door to conversation and awareness, opportunities to remind other women about breast health.  

It's not enough pink hair to start a rebellion.

When October passed and it was time to lose the pink, I couldn't do it.  I stayed pink for Christmas, for my last writing residency in January of 2013 in Oregon, and now I own it.    

I get some strange looks.  The pink's become so much a part of me that I sometimes forget it's there.  One time a school teacher told me that children are not allowed to wear any unusual hair color during the school year.  I told her that it's a sad world when children aren't permitted to express themselves.  Smirk.  

Pink attitude for artists and rebels and everyone in the tribe.

     

In case you've forgotten ...