Category Archives: CureDiva
Call me Shallow
It was Pinkoctober 2007. I was just separated after 13.5 years of complicated marriage. My kids were 12 & 9 & Broken. I was 40, a published writer and multi discipline artist, which meant I had no steady, or other, income; and just when I thought that anything that can go wrong has already went so wrong, then, came Polly*…
*Polly – my new pet, my Infiltrating ductal carcinoma, stage 1b grade 3, triple negative, BRCA1, double mastectomy, immediate reconstruction, adjuvant chemo, 3 additional reconstructions since.
There was not even one arena, in which I didn’t have to fight. Wherever I turned, there were struggles and challenges waiting to be solved.
But the one fight, which was inconceivably pointless and beyond my comprehension, was managing my everyday life, with the lack of accessibility and items, which were designed to answer my new and ever changing needs.
The last time I was so frustrated from that kind of “non-important stuff” was 13 years before, when I was pregnant, and all I could wear, were huge men shirts with leggings…
In both cases, I was overwhelmed; I was dealing with hope and fear, while undergoing a dramatic change in my life, my mind and my body. But, while maternity’s final output, is definitely a great reward for all the above, Cancer sucks.
The changes surgeries and treatments brought were extreme and cruel, within 3 months I’ve lost my 2 breasts, my hair and almost 20 pound of my weight.
Call me Shallow, but I wanted to feel pretty, at each and every phase of treatment and surgeries. Call me Rotten Spoiled, but I wanted to be comfort and confident, even when my breast was wounded, or when my head was bald. You can try calling me a Chauvinist, cooperating with the flatness perceptions of Beauty and Sensuality, but even if you were right, still, I wanted to feel beautiful…
It was Pinkoctober 2008 when I finished treatment; it was only then that I started deconstructing the hell I went through, and felt lonely and misunderstood. It took some long blogosphere nights, to figure, I was not alone and a few more to realize, there is so much to be done.
So, It took some time to recover, it took some time to sort the women I’ve become and figure the roads I should take. It took time, to meet the amazing, generous, smart mentors, which were just there, when I needed, and to find good partners, that see that have experienced the same firsthand (or other organs, but who counts..?!)
It is the end of Pinkoctober 2012. And here I am, a scared Survivor of all those fights, on my way to accomplish the mission: An easy path, to help us all cope with visibility issues, establish a source for all the knowledge and experience that exists between us, and add some normality into the routine of women coping with Breast Cancer.
The name is curediva.com – it will be launching soon as the holistic one stop shop and community, to all these “day to day” and lifestyle matters, which eventually makes life during Breast Cancer and beyond, for what it is. It might not save lives, but it is certainly going to make it easier and prettier… Well, yes, I guess you can call me Shallow, but I prefer Efrat
