Featured Stories Straight From Our Pages
Undeniable
My body is asking for me to be in it, to know it, to feel it. To stop ignoring it in favor of my mind.
My body is asking for appreciation. For everything I can do. For the distance I’ve walked this week and the 12-pound weights I’ve lifted. For sitting upright during a meeting, for lying down during a meditation. For carrying me around to meet friends for hangs in the park and buy early spring carrots at the farmer’s market.
My body is asking to be seen. Not by the male gaze, or most men gazing. Not in comparison to another woman, but to be witnessed and understood for its glorious aliveness. For the colors that adorn and the patterns that decorate.
Laughing Together
My stomach sank a little every time the numbers changed on the outdoor temperature screen. I was excited about the trip, but I was dreading leaving the air-conditioned bus. My boyfriend and I were heading south to meet with friends for a weekend of camping and swimming, a tradition stretching back more than 20 years that I was determined not to miss. At least that was the plan.
The white and yellow houses announced our destination, a village on Alentejo’s coast. I stepped out of the bus, and the hot dry air filled my lungs and burned my skin, triggering a hot flash that radiated to my now crimson face. We were in the middle of a heatwave, and it was my first post-menopausal summer.
Cancer Doesn’t Get to Come on the First Date
I was sitting on my patio with coffee in my Hello Kitty mug when I decided I might want to have sex again.
Not eventually.
Not theoretically.
I mean the actual kind.
With another human being.
This probably isn’t how inspirational metastatic breast cancer stories are supposed to begin, but after eight years of cancer, I’ve earned the right to skip the inspirational part.