Latest edition of Vita drops through my letter box. Oh dear am I the only woman with breast cancer who fails to see it as a life affirming condition with secondary cancer allowing ‘time for me.’
Real living with breast cancer seems airbrushed out of sight…we must not reveal what it’s really like…
I will blog some more on this.
Jane
Well it certainly allowing me time for me!
I am still in bed at 4-25pm can’t eat, feel sick, absolutely knackered, when I stretch to pick up laptop to see if there is anything interesting on the forum I feel as if I have done a shift in one of my pubs.
It is not what I call living it is barely existing and I for am p.ssed off and fear I have started ‘My Final Journey’
I will be shouting all the way going out totally disgracefully.
Secondary breast cancer is crap.
Love Debsxxx
Oh Debs so sorry you feel such crap. Steroids are making me feel high today but can’t walk more than 20 yards without being in pain.
Advanced breast candcer is indeed crap…shout it from the mountain tops.
Jane x
Jane sorry if this sounds ignorant, but what sort of a publication is Vita??
Sorry you two feel so crap. Secondary/Advanced Breast cancer is a whole bag full of it.
Why shouldn’t we shout it from the rooftops!!!?
Thinking of you both. Julie x
Vita is a free magazine published by Breast Cancer Care. Sort of Womans Own level (is Womans Own still published?!)
Actually right now today I’m not feeling crap…but I just get weary of secondary breast cancer being dressed up as the new must have accessory. But perhaps others like this mag??
Jane
My copy arrived today too, although I haven’t read it yet. I don’t have secondaries, but I can’t imagine viewing it as a life affirming condition. I look forward to reading your blog on this, Jane, and generally I’m very grateful that you tell it as it is - thank you.
Eliza
Read it once, won’t bother again. Rubbish. “Had cancer, now I’m perfect. Smarmy, superior and you know, just the sort of person who can handle things, and not smudge my make-up while I’m coping with you know, really awful things, but I’ve found it all so uplifting, and you know, whatever difficulties I’ve encountered, why, there’s always a solution - just pop on a camisole, phone this number…oh and it’s taught me so much, cancer really has made me a much better person. Much better than everyone else”
sno
I’ve tried to unsubscribe from receiving any more copies of Vita…am still receiving it though.
Snowwhite…just love your post…
Jane x
My copy has gone in the recycling bin !!!
Ah yes, thanks to BC I suddenly appreciate how wonderful life is and how lucky I am to have been stopped in my tracks to make me value my health. Goodness and I can feel smug when I hear of someone else’s diagnosis cos “I know exactly how you feel because I have been there myself” so I’m an expert! And yes, me time, I’m still waiting for that because the way to find me time is mostly to stop working and put yourself in dire financial straits if you haven’t already been axed or looked like a slacker because all the time off you take for appointment because your life has become medicalised.
All this just puts me in mind of the smiling woman on the front of the “prosthesis fitting” BCC leaflet. Yep, having to have a prosthesis was a real hoot and something I just couldn’t stop smiling about … I hope that one gets axed in the leaflet reviews this week!
Perhaps review/axe Vita and replace it with something else or just produce something much much better.
How do you get this “wonderful” magazine and why are some of you being sent it and not all of us? Or am I the only one to “be passed over” so to speak!!
I agree, I want one!!!Just to see.
type Vita in the search box and this will come up
Vita magazine (BCC125)
View all our publications
cover of Vita magazine (BCC125)
Issue 6 of Vita is now in stock!
As usual, this issue of Vita is packed full of inspiring real life stories from people who have been affected by breast cancer. There’s also lots of information on breast cancer treatments and healthy living. If you, or someone you know, have been affected by breast cancer, I’m sure you’ll find something of interest in this issue of Vita.
Order your copy online today, and sit back and enjoy the read.
Not everyone sits back and enjoys the read, some seem to spit blood instead. It’s not all sweetness and apple pie. How about a bit of information on unhealthy living? My remaining life is going to be devoted to sex and drugs and rock and roll. I find this much more inspiring. Only joking
Mole
Hmmm…the sex, drugs, rock and roll article was in issue 4 I believe. Tucked below the recipe for apple pie. 
I think I have been receiving Vita because I have been making a regular donation to BCC. To my mind there is no point in reading more than one issue. I haven’t found out anything I didn’t know before, and it just makes me feel cross and irritated. I have asked not to receive it in future, and feel the money used to produce it could be better used.
Jane, there you go again - voicing what was already in my head. I was really disappointed with this edition of Vita. I couldn’t help feeling a little wave of expectation - we all love a free magazine! but as others have said, it told me nothing I didn’t already know and, I’m sorry to say this guys, it sounded like it was written by people who haven’t had BC, but think they know what we’re interested in.
I appreciate it’s difficult to produce something that appeals to the whole range of people with BC - we are a wide and diverse group, and that’s just in terms of our disease and experience of treatments. Maybe they should just give up and let people use the website and forums to find the things that are relevant to them?
Jacquie
I have to agree with all previous comments.
I’ve had a look at this online and - oh, dear! With pictures occupying more space than the words and smiles everywhere, the alarm bells were ringing almost immediately.
If there has been no text at all, the big grins would have convinced me these were National Lottery winners.
This is obviously a publication whose goal is to not to inform but to dispense platitudes, to soothe, to radiate positivity in all directions. I cannot believe the target readership is us, the people who have it; it is surely meant to reassure the population at large that bc remains the fashionable, must-have-in-order-to-progress-from-healthy-ugly-duckling-to-beautiful-spiritually-enriched-swan disease.
Now, I’m a sporty person (as far as lymphoedema allows) and even I find the references to golf handicaps, marathons, pictures of yachts quite tiresome. The persistence in linking bc with an urge to pound pavements or swim the Channel, to ‘inspire’ others by some form of highly visible physical activity is deeply worrying.
I don’t care if I am a better person for having had bc. I’d much rather not have had it and remained a worse one.
X
S
If you don’t fit the Vita profile then you are a, or are made to feel like a, non-conformist.
I agree with Bahons. I’d much rather have stayed contented and whole and to hell with whatever I was like, and actually I was far nicer then - too long ago to remember how that felt and that person no longer exists.
I will never say “thanks to BC blah, blah, blah …”, I’d choke on it in the same way I choke on happy heroine wouldn’t-swap-this-for-anything stories and the ads in the likes of AMOENA with smiling women, who’ve cleary not had surgery, wearing lovely undies. Not to mention the BCC leaflet on bra ftting etc. with the woman on the front smiling as she shoves a prosthesis in her wonderful new pocketed bra - that should be banned.
Some reality please …
Reg.
I do agree with all the comments made on Vita but at the risk of being shot down in flames found one helpful piece of advice in the issue. The web site of new NICE guidelines on primary breast cancer. Maybe I am thick but I hadnt seen it before and would have found it difficult to find by googling. The guidelines have certainly raised some issues in my mind with regard to my own particular treatment plan which I intend to question.
But I do agree with the constant articles/pictures of happy, smiling bc patients! With nearly two years of treatment, no breast, and lymphoedema for all my trouble I am definitely not smiling. Indeed currently I am suffering a severe lack of self confidence and am avoiding people who new me before bc.
I do not think the media portray bc correctly at all. I think they are told not to for fear of scaring women thats if we are not scared enough already. I know when I first noticed an inverted nipple (in my ignorance) I had ABSOLUTELY no idea what lay ahead of me. The media portray (and non sufferers believe) oh you find a lump, go along, have it cut out, some radiotherapy and “Bobs Your Uncle” your okay now!!!
I think BCC needs to get a reality check as well. Certainly the course on lymphoedema I attended was of no use at all. Certainly not to sufferers.