Ellyn Davidson’s Weblog

I was working on my talk for St. John Health this morning while my little guy was playing. He asked me what I was doing and I told him I was working on my breast cancer talk. So I asked, “What does breast cancer mean?” and he said “It means you walk and I clap and I get a sucker.” I absolutely love this definition out of his, almost 3-year old, mouth.

Oops.  I’ve been neglecting my blog again.  There’s always so much to share but so little time.  I’ve started training again—pretty short distances at this point but still takes a chunk of time.  It feels good to get back in walking mode and now that the sun is finally shining, I can’t wait to get outside.  Work is keeping me busy too—writing proposals, proposals and more proposals and working on our Brogan & Partner’s blog.  I was extremely flattered to recently be named Breast Cancer Survivor of the Month on the breastcaresite.com.  And I still have my moments when I lose myself in Twitter and can’t find my way out.  If my tweet deck is up, breast cancer tweets pop up every other second and if they include links to articles or videos, I’m in big trouble.

This Saturday, I’m speaking at the St. John Health Breast Cancer Symposium.  Next week, I’ll be talking about Social Media to the Michigan Association of Realtors.  I’m looking forward to sharing my knowledge in both areas through other speaking engagements.  I’m also very busy ramping up fundraising efforts for the 3-Day.  While the economy is tough right now, it’s nowhere near as tough as cancer.  If you’ve got a spare $5, please donate. 

I found a site last night that I thought might be helpful to some of my readers.  It’s from a fellow FORCE member.  She chose to have a prophylactic mastectomy and does a wonderful job sharing details of her decision-making process, the surgery and post surgery.  I was too busy going through chemo and didn’t really pay much attention to the surgery and expansion process but I think this would so helpful to people who do have the BRCA mutation and may be considering surgery.  The unknown is always far scarier.  She does include pictures throughout the process and has yet to have her final reconstruction.  Thank you to Lianne for sharing your journey. 

Happy sunshine and spring to those of you living in the State of Michigan.  Hope the rest of the country is sunny today!

I’ve said before and I’ll say it again. I’m a lucky survivor. I caught my cancer early, I got my treatment and I feel great today. I did everything I could do to fight cancer—double mastectomy, lymph nodes removed, chemotherapy, oophorectomy combined with a full hysterectomy. My oncologist told me that even the most conservative radiation oncologist would not suggest radiation. I count my blessings everyday and continue to fight for my friends, Cousin, Mother, Grandmother, Aunt, Sisters-in-Law, Daughter and all the other women and girls out there. Until there is a cure, we must be absolutely vigilant about our health. In the world of breast cancer, there are many things we can do. We can know our genetic status, we can go for yearly mammograms (or more frequently, if necessary), and we can do monthly self-breast exams. We can catch this disease early.

Unfortunately, we are not so lucky with other cancers—specifically ovarian cancer. But there is something that everyone can do right now—today–to help in this fight. We can ask our Senators to support two very important ovarian cancer programs. One is dedicated to research and one is dedicated to raising awareness so we can catch this disease earlier. This will take no time but it will help save lives. Please do your part for all the women in our lives. Together we can continue to make a difference.