Hairy Situation

So there are all these phenomenal people gathered in Dallas for a few days to affectionately drink the pink Kool-aid with each other. Believe me when I tell you that I have the 64 OZ Big Gulp on this one - I believe so passionately in our mission to end breast cancer forever but I do wish we would hurry up because pink is really NOT my color. I'm more of a blue girl but I digress.

We were in the midst of some heavy hitting cancer docs - Sloan Kettering, Harvard, MD Anderson, Indidana University - you get the picture. We also heard what our sister affiliates are doing to make an impact in their community. In one big-city affiliate they discovered that African American women were dying of BC at twice the rate of their White counterparts and they decided to do something about it. Their grass roots activisim is impressive and they had a panel discussion about their initiatives.

Heard afterwards: OH MY GOD - did you see her hair? You couldn't see half of her face. Was she hiding a scar?

I am not proud to admit that I participated in this discussion about this VERY SMART FEMALE DOCTOR because truth be told, it was distracting. However, upon reflection I thought that it was very ironic that for so many of us who have TOTALLY LOST OUR HAIR to chemotherapy and dealt with hair trauma issues (for many of us, the most devastating part of the cancer process) that there was so much discussion about "the hair presenter." So was it true that our bald heads were distracting? Were you not to listening to us but assessing what was wrong with us? And why do we judge so harshly on grooming and dress for women? And did we miss the point: SHE WAS DOING SOMETHING ABOUT THE BREAST CANCER DISPARITY ISSUES IN HER COMMUNITY.

I wish I would have been a better listener.