Pink is just a color

Fighting Pretty would like to introduce Alexis ~ a gorgeous MD who has had her share of cancer woes. You may have seen some pretty amazing photos of her in our newsletter, other blog posts or even on Facebook. She is incredible, she is strong, she is beautiful and truly Fighting Pretty! Alexis is a guest blogger of ours who shares her insight on her feelings around October and how we need to remember that pink is just a color.

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I'm not angry.  Though I think most people expect me to be.  However, I will admit: October is a difficult month for me, and what I can only imagine are so many other stage 4 breast cancer survivors.  Pink has taken on an entirely different meaning to me.  Once my favorite color that flooded my wardrobe, baby pink, hot pink, fluorescent pink and all variations are no longer a benign hue in the spectrum of a color I once loved. 

When I was first diagnosed, pink meant sisterhood.  But as I began to see more and more pink: at car washes, ribbons on the sides of soup cans, on the sides of trucks hauling cargo across country, I began to wonder if it was losing its meaning altogether. The "October Walks" feature women infantilized  in pink boas, tutus and pink hair extensions.  Sometimes I feel very frustrated, because it doesn't seem like they are taking this extremely serious disease seriously enough.  And despite all of this awareness, I wonder how women can continue to skip their mammograms yearly? And then I wonder, not only as a survivor but as a physician: are these pink-washed awareness events effective at all?  

I feel like a veteran in this war; having survived with breast cancer for the past two and a half years. Yet its hard to not feel your foundation shattered and your resolve broken at times; having progressed from stage 3 to stage 4, enduring chemotherapy four times, and countless other therapies which failed me.  Yet I am a veteran, a veteran at age 33, but I don't wear a pink uniform. The founding force behind Fighting Pretty, Kara Dolce, once sent an inspirational card to me:  "Accept all that the day brings forth to you as a gift". I keep this on my mantle, it is the first thing I see when I awake every morning, and I'm writing now as an open letter; a call to arms.  To not become hard after life has challenged you the way it has for me.  To not allow cancer to win by destroying your heart, and your hope. When you do wake up, thank God, whatever spiritual entity you believe in, or simply yourself for the moment to live another day.  Stage 4 isn't easy.  Its full of ups and downs, disappointments and small victories.  Please don't think this is a life sentence of misery and solitude.  Work if you can, see friends, spend time with family, take a vacation, make a life move, LET YOURSELF FALL IN LOVE, (and hate the color pink if you want to).  But please, don't be angry.  You are still alive, you still have the capability to to all of these things; cancer cannot take that away from you.  Don't let yourself feel like you're dying. And if you cannot move past that fear: a stage all of us may fall in and out of at times; just remember: As much as death is a part of life, LIFE IS what you are experiencing here and now.  

Pink is just a color. October is a month full of beautiful fall leaves, pumpkins, seasonal beers and coffees, and one of my favorite holidays: Halloween.  Though its hard because it is the month that challenges my strength by forcing me to consistently acknowledge something painful that I am already reminded of daily, I am thankful that it may spark the curiosity of women to perform self breast exams, follow through with their annual cancer screening protocols, and consider the struggle of all survivors.  For me, I try to fill the days with "not-pink-related" events. The days between my scans, chemotherapy and doctors appointments can simply be October days that I share with my loved ones, colleagues and mentors. And of course I always remember: This is a fight, not only a fight against cancer but a fight against the demons that can overcome us and fill us with fear, loss of hope and the feeling that we aren't physically beautiful anymore.  That is not true ladies.  Put on your best lipstick, buy a sexy wig, throw on high heels and take on this disease as the beautiful and fearless fighter you are.  ENJOY the compliments! You deserve them, and when life gives you lemons: don't make lemonade...bake a chocolate cake in heels and leave them all wondering how you did it.    (Footnote: the heels don't have to be pink ;) )

With love, 

Alexis