Support &Advocate

Days are set aside to commemorate different things, mark anniversaries and so forth. When a whole month is set out to create awareness, you know it’s serious and people mean business. October was made the official breast cancer month in 1984 and the movement has grown in leaps and bounds as women religiously support each other. I think it is the only time women are not being their own enemies. If it is detected early enough, it can be controlled

Since inception of World Breast Cancer Awareness Month (WBCAM), women oriented organizations, mostly, have consistently made it their sole aim to promote breast cancer awareness. All over the world, women are enlightened on how to take charge of their own breast health. Mainly, self-breast exam being the easiest and cheapest way to help women detect any changes in their breasts for early detection.A mammogram is recommended annually for women from 40 years to 70. A cancer's stage is a crucial factor in deciding what treatment options to recommend, and in determining the patient's prognosis. 

Breast cancer is not a foreign ailment as it is the most common malevolence in women worldwide both in developed and underdeveloped countries. Most of those who succumb are from low- and middle-income countries, where most women with breast cancer are diagnosed in late stages due mainly to lack of awareness on early detection and barriers to health services.

You have either lost a friend or a relative or know someone who is suffering from it. There’s a probability of 1 in 8 women developing breast cancer in her lifetime.  A minority of these cases are hereditary say less than 10%. Breast cancer most commonly develops in cells from the lining of milk ducts and the lobules that supply the ducts with milk. There are more than 18 other sub-types of breast cancer. Some cancers develop from pre-invasive lesions.

Men also suffer from Breast Cancer, however in very rare cases. This occurs mainly at the age of 65 and above. There have been a few cases of younger men suffering from breast cancer between the age of 20 -90. “The American Cancer Society estimates that each year, about 1,990 new cases of breast cancer in men will be diagnosed and that breast cancer will cause approximately 480 deaths in men. A man’s lifetime risk of developing breast cancer is about one in a thousand.” –Sy Kraft (B.A) , Medical News Today.

Compiled by Tracy Gesare

Source Wikipedia, WHO, WebMD

Teenager Extraordinaire

Teenagers making waves all over is something we could have been used to already. Well, we are told that the future belongs to the youths – teenagers are early youths too – and some of us have taken it too seriously now that the future is here.

 I don’t quite remember doing something productive with myself during my teenage years, which I should have, my excuse being a small town has zilch to offer. What are the current 17 year olds doing? The ones you know. Your brother/sister, cousin, niece, nephew, friends? However it is not about me or them or Kylie Jenner today. Ladies and Gentlemen introducing *drumrolls please* Malala Yousafzai!!! I’m just excited; my shadiness can take a seat now.

Of course I didn’t grow up in the same neighborhood as Malala, neither am I friends with her older sibling or something, I certainly googled her. I wasn’t the least bit stunned to see a “why do most people hate Malala?” title on the search. Whether you do bad or good, there will always be a hater somewhere either talking smack about you or planning to do not so good things to you.

Malala is a teenager of Pakistani origin born in 1997. She is an activist for female Education whose backing has gone global and even won her a Nobel-Prize on 10^th October this year: exactly two years after she was shot in the head. She started out by writing an anonymous blog for BBC, giving conditions under the local Taliban rule which had also banned girls from attending school. This landed her in a New York Times Documentary which in return got her interviews on print and Television. Later that year South African Activist Desmond Tutu nominated her for the International Children’s Peace Prize.

Miss Yousafzai has co-written a book “I am Malala: The girl who stood Up for Education and was Shot by the Taliban.”  A not so average life will earn you not so average hater’s girl. Good choice though.  Her bravery has seen her bag accolades from every front. Malala was the winner of Pakistani’s first ever National Youth Peace Prize, was featured (and listed) on Time magazine in May 2013 as one of the 100 most influential people in the world, among others. She was to receive an honorary citizenship in Canada but was cancelled due to the emergency situation in Ottawa where shootings took place near Parliament Hill.

She has also been listed in the Time Magazine again as the Top 100 most influential teenagers alongside  First children Sasha and Malia Obama, models and reality show stars Kendall and Kylie Jenner, and artiste Lorde. A Malala Fund set up by Vital voices to benefit the girl child education has attracted hefty donations, such as Jolie, who reportedly pledged a donation of  200,000 USD.

World Wide Discoveries.

The internet is a vast world in its own existence. There is so much put up every second and a little of it taken down at the same time I presume. It doesn't fill up any space (I'm thinking) but it exists. Tons and tons of peoples work, imagination, creations and folly all of it wrapped up in one. It is a wonderful thing I would say but it can also ruin your life. Case of a typical two sides of the coin.

A friend introduced me to an art and humanity page called Humans of New York and I have never looked back. They have a way of having people open up very little random things about themselves. Some are emotional, some are funny, but most have a thing or two you can learn from life in general. Tonight the articles that have touched me speak for themselves in their few words. 

"It's hard for me to materialize things into form. I'm full of regrets, I've got poor self-esteem. Every time I start doing something, I get down on myself and quit. I wasn't a leader when I was young, and I fell into all the wrong things. Eventually I got into doing drugs, then selling drugs, and I ended up going to prison."

"How'd it all end?"

"I was one robbed one night, and learned who did it, so I decided to get back at the guy. I wasn't really thinking at the time. I was high out of my head, we were listening to Metallica, smoking PCP, and all my friends were yelling at me to do something. So we found the guy and I slashed him with a box cutter and hit him with the shaft of a steering wheel. I went home and told my mother that if the cops come, to tell them I was home all night. Then I took off down Ditmars Boulevard, and after I drove a few miles, cop cars started coming at me from everywhere."

2.

“I’ve written so many stories and novellas that nobody will look at, plays that I can’t get produced, screenplays that will never be made. Everything is so branded these days in the art world, it’s so hard for an outsider to get work.”

“In what way would you consider yourself an ‘outsider?’”

“I’m interested in failure, so those are the themes that I like to explore. But we live in a society that celebrates triumphalism. A society wants art that reaffirms itself. We want to read about characters that win.” 

“What was your lowest moment as an artist?”

“I worked on a screenplay for two years, and it had just been turned down by the fifth theater in a month, and I remember walking down 5th avenue in the middle of winter, tossing the pages one by one into the slush, vowing never to do it again. It was just a few blocks from here, actually.”

That's all folks and thank YOU for stopping by. You are amazing.