REAL awareness. and truths.

"When I walked into the doctor's office, I was really rather pleased with myself, all things considered, pleased with the way I felt, with my own flair, with my own style. The doctor's nurse, a charmingly bright and steady woman of about my own age who had always given me a feeling of quiet no-non-sense support on my other visits, called me into the examining room. On the way, she asked me how I was feeling.
"Pretty good," I said, half-expecting her to make some comment about how good I looked.
"You're not wearing a prosthesis," she said, a little anxiously, and not at all like a question.
"No," I said, thrown off my guard for a minute. "It really doesn't feel right," referring to the lambswool puff given to me by the Reach For Recovery volunteer in the hospital.
Usually supportive and understanding, the nurse now looked at me urgently and disapprovingly as she told me that even if it didn't look exactly right it was "better than nothing," and that as soon as my stitches were out I could be fitted for a "real form."
"You will feel so much better with it on," she said. "And besides, we really like you to wear something, at least when you come in. Otherwise it's bad for the morale of the office."
I could hardly believe my ears! I was too outraged to speak then, but this was to be only the first assault on my right to define and to claim my own body."

the above words are reference to October, 1978 shortly following her mastectomy and is an excerpt from page 60 of "The Cancer Journals" (Special Edition), 1980, by Audre Lorde

and 22 years later.
May 2000.


and 26 years later.
March 2004.

and 29 years later on a Wednesday.
April 2007.

and in the spring.
April 2007.

and in the Fall.
September 2007.


and 30 years later in the summer.
August 2008.