Thursday, January 7, 2010

Chocolate Brown

As many of you may have noticed, my status for the last couple of hours as been simply, "Chocolate Brown." You may have also noticed that I'm not the only one out there who has some sort of color as their current status.

If you haven't been let in on the secret yet, here it is: "Chocolate Brown" is the color of the bra I am currently wearing.

Yup. You read that right. I'm wearing a chocolate brown bra right now. What color are you wearing?

I was so curious as to why all my girlfriends had colors up as their status. I come to find out that someone late yesterday/early today started sending out a message to girl's Facebook Inboxes saying something to the effect of "let's take over facebook" and put our status as the color of our bra to 'confuse the guys."

Apparently this silly idea didn't go very far. I mean, who cares? I have better things to do with my time than try and confuse boys. I can do that just by being a woman. BUT when someone decided to add purpose to this little endeavor, it EXPLODED. That purpose?

BREAST CANCER AWARENESS

Who wouldn't want to jump on that bandwagon!? Of course, you get your naysayers out there who ask, "how on earth can that help? How stupid." Well Mr. Negative Nelly - I'll tell ya what purpose it serves! The "secret" element to it all compelled people figure it out - to be "in the know." In essence, to do some research. Because of this phenomenon, people have been stumbling across blogs like this:

cancerspot.org

Go on. Read it. I'll wait.

You done yet? Good. How great was that? So well put.

Ok, Ok. Let's face it. Negative Nelly is right - Letting the whole world know what color my bra is has ZERO effect on breast cancer research or even awareness. But when my color, combined with everyone else willing to participate encourages flow of information and ideas, it has a HUGE impact. People get information they didn't have. (Did you know that men can get breast cancer, too? Did you know that, according to the CDC, 41,116 women and 375 men died from breast cancer in 2005? Did you know that breast cancer is the 7th most common cause of death among women (Also CDC)? Bet you didn't. See? You just learned something.) This silly crazy exercise obviously draws attention to breasts in general. My fellow blogger is right - while your down there checking out that awesome color, give yourself a breast exam.

Instructions for giving a self-exam can be found here:
http://www.breastcancer.org/symptoms/testing/types/self_exam/bse_steps.jsp

I felt compelled to blog. Cancer has touched my life in the cruelest of ways over the years. Fierce battles that have been fought hard and finally lost. But they fought to live because they had the chance. They got help because they could. It makes me SO angry when I hear stories of people who die from this disease, but could have been saved with early detection. I have been giving myself a "Self breast exam" from the age of 16. Once a month, EVERY month. No exceptions.

And ladies - a tip for you. Let's be honest - no one knows your knockers like your boyfriend (or girlfriend)/fiance/husband (or wife), right? Let them give you the exam. They may notice something you won't. And they'll think you are SO COOL for letting them do it. ;-)

I lost my Grandmother to breast cancer in 2002. We lost her sister, my Aunt, just last month to the same. Enough is enough. We have the power to take action. For all the naysayers out there who said "this is dumb - wouldn't donating to research be more helpful?" I say yes! It would be more helpful! Get off your butt and do it instead of picking on those who are trying to make a difference! To those who are aware that breast cancer runs in your family - be responsible! Self exams starting right this second! Annual exams without relenting! To everyone on the whole planet (because it isn't just breast cancer - it is all cancer) Educate yourselves. Knowledge is power.

In the meantime, I am proud to tell you that it's Chocolate brown. All day. Tomorrow will more than likely be black.

I will get off my soap box when every man on the planet knows they are subject to this too. I will get off my soap box when every woman does monthly self exams, annual paps, and regular mammograms when the time comes. Until then, I'm never going to stop talking about it. I'm never going to ease up. I'm never going to let it slide. We can change the future. We can change the outcome. But just like this little exercise, it can't just be me. It's gotta be everyone. EVERYONE has got to get in the know.

-Jen

6 comments:

  1. Hooray for making a difference! Well said my dear :)

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  2. Wow, Jen! I'll post the link to this on my fb page.

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  3. Great post Jen. It's really nice to see that people actually viewed the bra colors as something more than just a funny idea to post as their status or as something to do because all their friends were. The reason behind it is exactly what you have blogged about here, to heighten the awareness of breast cancer prevention and save lives. Well said Jen!

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