Lorde did express her feelings clearly stating that, “Prosthesis offers that empty comfort of “Nobody will know the difference”. But it is the very difference which I wish to affirm, because I have lived it, and survived it, and wish to share that strength with other women. If we are to translate the silence surrounding breast cancer into language and action against this scourge, then the first step is that women with mastectomies become visible to each other, for silence and invisibility go hand in hand with powerlessness”. “The Cancer Journals, 1980”. Lorde did talk about the process she had to endure on a personal level that took her on a journey of denial through acceptance.
She states in the first paragraph “… I haven’t noticed any women like me on television…” yet her next paragraph is centered on a television show about a woman with MS. Mairs tries to redeem herself by describing how this woman’s emotional weakness, for running back to her doctor/love interest, is inaccurate, but that is mostly a sexist representation of women and less a misrepresentation of the disabled. Mairs continues the rest of the essay in her mostly hostile fashion. She tosses in many rhetorical devices to the reader which, admittedly, makes her feel somewhat relatable and real. Her informal style of writing makes it seem like she knows her reader on an intimate level, therefor you are more inclined to accept her statements without evidence, succumbing to her requests for disability to be viewed as normal. She wraps up her essay
to secure one thing, his sense of personal dignity" (1021). As cancer, she maintains her composure and begins analyzing what the doctor is saying. Vivian is consumed with assessment and investigation, which makes her a worry really hard. Her extreme need for knowledge, which can be perceived as her tragic flaw, causes her to be unaware to the reality of her diagnosis: she is going to die. At the end of Vivian and Dr. Kelekian’s conversation Vivian decides that she will take the “full dose” of chemotherapy for the following eight months.
Vivian realizes this issue when she is treated as a cancer patient with the full dose of chemotherapy. Dr. Harvey Kelekian and Dr. Jason Posner treat her as a disease-carrier, rather than an individual. This changes her views on life and causes her to reevaluate herself. Bearing realizes this issue as she narrates the play and shows us her opinion through monologues and statements. Vivian reflects on her actions with students and reassesses her life through flashbacks.
Bearing, being a hard-nosed, uncompromising type, agrees to the treatment. She attempts to be tolerant and suffers through endless tests, "fake" concern from staff, and the poking and prodding of fellowship doctors on rounds, who gleefully gaze upon her like a child's science experiment; viewing her simply as "research" and not as a human being. Through this ordeal, Dr. Bearing faces the loneliness of the hospital, as well as the grueling passage of time in the isolation ward as she suffers the after effects of chemotherapy. She takes this time to reflect upon her life, and how "putting a semicolon instead of a comma in the wrong place, can change the meaning of
Her topic is very controversial, especially almost nineteen years ago. She had to be careful in her diction and her presentation because AIDS and HIV is a subject that people can be very passionate about and she had to make sure not to offend anyone. She used her words to show the audience that she was not there for pity but for their attention. Not only just their attention but their acceptance, their support and most importantly for them to be educated. The most difficult thing she had to do was work with an audience who ultimately had little experience and knowledge with HIV or anything that Fisher was going
“The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman has three themes: becoming free, madness, and the dangers of the “rest cure.” The story is written as the secret diary of a woman who is diagnosed with temporary nervous depression by her husband and doctor and is prescribed the “rest cure.” Though the narrator wants to write, she is prohibited from any activity due to her treatment. Thus, allowing her to create a figure in the yellow wallpaper while in the confinement of her room. Gilman writes in "The Yellow Wallpaper" of the narrator who is apparently trying to free herself from her sickness and the room, and she is trying to free the woman in the wallpaper. Throughout the story, the narrator, also known as the protagonist of the story, is trying to free herself from her illness. Readers can see this when Gilman writes, "I think sometimes that if I were only well enough to write a little it would relieve the press
Due to society’s creation of unrealistic images of what women are supposed to look like, many women who have lost a breast to cancer with experience a decrease in self-esteem and have other negative emotions. Coming to terms with breast loss and its effect on body image, feminity and self-esteem are major issues confronting women who have lost a breast or both breasts to cancer. Messages from the media, cosmetic surgery and health care profession perpetuate the beauty myth affecting the self-esteem of women diagnosed with breast cancer. The beauty myth says that to be attractive, women need to look a certain way and dress a certain way. Women who have lost their breast to cancer may feel pressured to search for a cure that produces social acceptance.
In the lobby there was a soothing water wall. I spent many hours staring at the flowing water, and listening to the gentle sounds trying to occupy my mind. Trying not to think about the woman upstairs that barely resembled my Mom. Not think about how thin she had become, or how sick she was going to be in another two or three days from the toxic brew of drugs they were pumping into her. All in the hopes of killing some microscopic cells that had invaded her body like an unwanted, unwelcome guest.
Physician-assisted suicide for patients who are in a great amount of pain should not be illegal. The patients live everyday wishing they could die to end their pain. Sigmund Freud was in extraordinary pain from cancer. He whispered to his physician, "This makes no more sense." His doctor then injected him with