How about real Breast Cancer Awareness?

standard jessica October 11, 2010 10 responses

I’m not playing the “I like it…” game on Facebook this year. I didn’t play the bra color game last October either. Not because I don’t believe in Breast Cancer Awareness, quite the opposite in fact.

I believe in doing it the right way.

Last year the game seemed silly to me even before reading Susan Nieber ‘s– aka Why Mommy – post on the subject. Then it seemed downright cruel.

People were trying to raise awareness for a cause by flaunting the very thing that women who were in the thick of that issue could no longer use – bras.

Most women who have had mastectomies no longer wear bras, so, as a whole, they felt shut out of this viral campaign. Ironic? Right?

This year the campaign tries to be more inclusive by focusing on purses instead of bras. But at the end of the day the issue is a bit the same.

Breast cancer isn’t funny.

Susan Nieber once again wrote a post decrying the point of this campaign, this time she posted it at Salon.com. She wants to know why people are joking around while women are dying.

Here’s the thing as I see it. You slap up a pink banner on your site, you buy a pink t-shirt, you post a quippy “I like it in the backseat!” post on Facebook. And then you walk away. You feel like you did your part and you can give yourself a nice pat on the back.

But really? What have you done to further the cause of Breast Cancer Awareness? Did you share some stats and information with someone? Do you really think that the 10c from the proceeds of that shirt are going to make an impact on Breast Cancer research? Do you really think that funny Facebook post did any good?

Breast Cancer is becoming that thing. The “oh yeah! Breast Cancer, it’s a problem, right?” thing. All the pink t-shirts and ribbons are having the opposite effect. Instead of raising true awareness they’re raising acceptance.

And you know what? Acceptance is BAD. We don’t WANT people to become jaded and accepting of this disease that’s killing women right and left. Women YOU know. Women YOU see every day.

So instead of posting a funny post to my Facebook page I’m posting this post and sharing Susan’s letter. And I’m not going to tell you not to play, but I am going to beg you to ALSO post a link to a place where people can get information or where they can make a real difference.

Visit the American Cancer Society to learn about Breast Cancer and all sorts of other cancers, find out what you can do to help raise awareness and money for research.

Buy a Tiny Prints Breast Cancer Awareness Greeting Cardhttp://www.tinyprints.com/greeting/promo/bca.htm. The entire proceed for the cards go to The Pink Agenda for Breast Cancer research.(Sorry, I work there, but I also happen to be really excited about this campaign which helps people on every end.)

Join the Army of Women and do your part to further the research.Whether or not you have had breast cancer or are high risk, you might have the information someone conducting a study could use. Sign up. You never know.

And before you buy something with a pink ribbon on it, do a little research about how much of your money is actually being donated. Lots of companies are taking advantage of the pink to make a lot of extra bucks.

So? How about it? Are you participating in the Facebook “game?”

(FYI: This post was cross posted to Yahoo! Shine and received interesting comments over there.)

chocolate, donating, love

Share Something Sweet

standard jessica February 14, 2009 Leave a response

Have you sent any Valentines Day cards to anyone this year? No? Not yet? Well, it’s not too late and even better, if you procrastinated a bit, now you get to do a doubly good thing.

Hop over to http://www.sharesomethingsweet.com/send_something_sweet and share something sweet with everyone you know. For every card that you send from the Share Something Sweet site The Ferrero Company (of the infamous Ferrero chocolates) will donate $1 to Share Our Strength, a leading hunger relief organization.

So, what are you waiting for? Go send some cards and feed some children!

Oh, and then hop on over to The Lemonade Stand where in honor of this chocolatey love fest the wonderful people of The Ferrero Company and I are giving away not one but two boxes of chocolates.

Happy Valentines Day everyone. I love each and every one of you.

Charlotte, donating, family, Team in Training

My sister is running for a cure and she needs your help

standard jessica December 13, 2008 3 responses

I’ve mentioned my older sister, but I’m not sure I ever mentioned that I also have a younger sister. (Who for the purpose of this post we shall call Charlotte because I’m about to send you to a page where you’ll see her name anyway so it really makes no sense to call her by her initial.) She doesn’t blog and she lives way on the other side of the country so she doesn’t figure too often in the daily goings on, but she totally rocks and I wish she did live closer so she could figure more often in our day to day lives. Because she rocks. Did I mention that? If she wasn’t already my little sister I would totally adopt her and make her become my little sister. No joke.

She’s a nursing student at NYU and she’s training to run a marathon in May. A marathon! I can make it around the block before I collapse. She’s going to run 26.2 MILES. And even if she only does the 1/2 marathon, which she claims is what she’s going to do, but I don’t believe her, and neither do the people she’s training with, that’s still 13 some miles more than I can manage.

Why should you care, you ask? Well, I’m so glad you did, see, my little sister needs your help. (And I would like to preface this with the fact that I am not good at asking for help, and I rarely do it, so please be nice.) As it turns out my sister is training with The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society’s (LLS) Team in Training and in order to run she needs to have raised a certain amount of dough for . $2,600.00 to be precise. To date she has raised $485.00, which is great, but clearly not enough.

If she doesn’t raise enough money she either has to drop out, which she really doesn’t want to do, or she has to pay the difference, which she really can’t do. And this is where you come in. (Insert sheepish grin here.)

See, if you were already in a donating mood, because, say, it was the holidays or you were feeling generous tonight, and you thought that helping to find a cure for Leukemia and Lymphoma was a worthy cause, you could, for instance, click here and do a double good deed: help fund a cure and help my sister reach her goal. Think of the great karma! Think of Santa’s good list! Think of… think of whatever motivates you, but please, please help. Pretty please? With sugar on top? And a cherry? And an extra drizzle of hot fudge?

Did I mention that this is where you have to click? Ok! Ok! Just checking. Sheesh.

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Tomorrow we return to our regularly scheduled ~~nonsense~~ program, or maybe Sunday, because tomorrow is going to be a long day of baby showers and Christmas parties (both real and virtual) and deadlines I may or may not meet, though I will try my best to provide you with a picture of my darling children sitting on Santa’s lap.

Original It’s my life… post.