The evening of the day my hair started to fall out, Christie, Barbara and I were having dinner at one of our favorite restaurants. Naturally, I had to tell them how it all happened.

“Guess what happened this morning?”

“What happened, Deb?” Christie asked, leaning forward in anticipation.

“I reached up to pull some fuzz out of my hair and the whole clump of hair came out. I’m losing my hair!”

“Wow! What did you do?”

“I kept pulling pieces from different places on my head - then I showered and washed my hair to see how much more would come out.”

Christie was fascinated. Barbara was unnaturally quiet.

“You know what would be fun?” I said, “Let’s go back to my house after dinner, sit on the deck, and see if we can make a checkerboard pattern on my head!”

“How can you talk like that!!?” Barbara shouted at us. Our heads whipped around as we looked at her with astonishment.

“She’s losing her hair! That’s terrible!” Barbara was near tears.

“It’s her hair, Barbara,” Christie murmured soothingly. But Barbara was not to be comforted. Barbara was one of those people for whom hair is a very important thing.

I didn’t realize right away that many people would be distraught about losing their hair. I had to learn about it from others.

When I spoke at a conference not long ago about my experiences, for example, one of the women from the audience told me how it was for her. She just shook her head, “I couldn’t bear to lose my hair - it’s who I am - my whole image of me is wrapped up in how I look with my hair!”

I was lucky that way. My image isn’t tied to the way my hair looks. For me, one of the hardest adjustments was not being able to do all the things I was used to doing.

I hated the “nap attacks” and not being able to just get up and go do the things I love to do. I found that my identity was tied up in being a doer. Not doing was hard and having to ask for help was harder, much harder for me than worrying about how my hair looks.

Even so, losing my hair meant something else that many of us with cancer have to deal with. Until we lose our hair, most of us look fairly normal. Losing our hair is the step that firmly sets us apart from the rest of the population.

We’ll always be apart from them. Once you’ve had breast cancer, even if you’re free of symptoms for years, you know that it can always recur. As a friend said to me, “Once you’ve had breast cancer you can’t be sure it won’t come back until you die of something else.”

That’s the shadow that’s always lurking around the corner. It’s also the reality that puts other things, like being bothered by asking for help, or losing your hair, into perspective.

For me the hair issue was easily solved. A few days after that dinner with Christie and Barbara, I decided to shave my head.

First, I went to the beauty parlor and got “buzzed.” Then I went home and borrowed my husband’s shaving cream and razor and shaved the stubble off to be truly “bald.”

I didn’t stay bald, but I did find that I liked short hair. You can see how I looked before and after chemo by visiting one of the photo galleries. And you can see how I look today by checking out the picture on the main page of this site.

Everyone who gets breast cancer has lots of hard things they have to deal with. But for me, checkerboard hair was one of the easy ones.

Deb Haggerty is a breast cancer survivor who helps women with breast cancer and their loved ones by providing information, inspiration, and links to resources through her web site Positive Hope ( positivehope.com positivehope.com).

The Checkerboard Hair experience was part of Deb’s Breast Cancer Journey ( positivehope.com/email_diary positivehope.com/email_diary).

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Cervical cancer is a type of cancer that affects woman. The most common victims of cervical cancer are older woman (i.e. 40 ). Cervical cancer is generally caused by HPV (human papilloma virus) which gets transmitted through sexual contact and over a period of time (which can last for years) leads to cancerous cervix cells.

Prevention against cervical cancer

Since HPV gets sexually transmitted, having multiple sex partners can increase the chances of occurrence of cervical cancer. The anti-bodies produced by our body are the best guard against HPV and anything that causes our immune system to weaken can also aid in development of cervical cancer. In that sense, taking good care of your health too is a preventive measure for cervical cancer.

Symptoms of cervical cancer

The most common symptoms of cervical cancer include pelvic pain or pain during intercourse, unexpected vaginal discharge or bleeding, increase in the frequency of urination etc. However, the occurrence of these symptoms doesn’t necessarily imply cervical cancer. These symptoms just suggest that cervical cancer could be a possibility and hence point to the need of undergoing other cervical cancer tests

Detecting cervical cancer

One of the best ways of detecting cervical cancer is to undergo routine/ regular cervical cancer screening tests. The cervical cancer screening test (i.e. the pap test or the pap smear test) is one of the best ways of catching cervical cancer in early stages. This test is not at all painful and just involves brushing off of cells from your cervix for microscopic examination. The pap test results are generally given as a rating on a scale of 1 to 5 where in 1 indicates normal cervix cells and 5 indicates serious cancer signs. Though medical research is constantly trying to create new and better ways of detecting cervical cancer, Pap tests are the best technique that we have available today for early detection of cervical cancer. However, pap tests are not always accurate and if other symptoms strongly suggest cervical cancer, a second round of cervical tests might be recommended by the doctor.

Treatment of cervical cancer

The treatment of cervical cancer is effective mostly when the cervical cancer is detected while it is still in its early stages. The treatment involves surgical procedures (including removal of uterus, fallopian tubes and ovaries), chemotherapy and radiation. The earlier you are able to detect cervical cancer, the better are your chances of cure. In fact, pap tests can even detect pre-cancerous stage and hence make the treatment of cervical cancer even more effective.

Warren and Karen have been involved in the internet for a number of years and run several websites. They are most interested in providing opportunities for people to connect with information relating to business, health and creativity. Check out their cervical-cancer.blogspot.com” target=”_New Cervical Cancer blog for more information.

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It’s a sad but true fact that this year well over 30,000 men in the United States will die from prostate cancer despite the fact that, in many cases, the warning signs of a developing problem will have been clearly evident and simply ignored.

Like many cancers, prostate cancer can develop with very few if any cancer prostate symptoms in its early stages. Most men will however also develop another prostate problem during their middle and later years known as an enlarged prostate, or benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH), which will display a range of symptoms. There is no connection between the two conditions and one will not cause the other, although both will commonly be present at the same time.

What this means in simple terms is that the vast majority of men will develop a range of symptoms in their middle and later years which point to a problem with the prostate gland and which could be simply a benign enlarged prostate or prostate cancer or both. And what do they do? Well, in most cases they simply ignore the symptoms as a sign of the normal ageing process.

Most of the symptoms of a developing prostate problem are associated with your ability to urinate and will include an increasing difficulty in starting urination (a need to strain in order to begin urinating), a weak or slow flow of urine once urination begins with a tendency for that flow to stop and start and a taking a long time to finish urinating. In addition many men experience a need to urinate frequently with difficulty in waiting and often a need to get up regularly during the night to visit the bathroom.

At this stage all too few men will pop in to see their doctor who will diagnose the problem as simply being an enlarging prostate and the patient will be happy to live with the minor inconvenience, knowing that it is not serious, or may be prescribed medication to relieve the symptoms. More importantly, in making his diagnosis, the doctor will also run a couple of simple tests to check for the presence of prostate cancer and, where this is found it is often at a very early stage and can be effectively treated.

For the majority of men who simply ignore the symptoms (or diagnose themselves as simply having an enlarging prostate) it will be the arrival of additional symptoms such as increasing tiredness, pain in the back, hips and thighs and an unexplained weight loss that will eventually force then to consult their doctor. By this time their prostate cancer will almost certainly have spread and is quite probably beyond the stage at which it can be cured.

The vast majority of prostate cancer deaths could be avoided if men would simply consult their doctors when signs of a developing prostate problem appear, rather than simply ignore then.

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Every year in the UK around 1,600 people die from mesothelioma, a terminal lung disease which is normally caused by contact with asbestos. Many of the people who have learnt the devastating news that they are suffering from an incurable condition, have made the decision to speak to a personal injury solicitor. A solicitor with expertise in this area of the law can help them to make a personal injury claim. Asbestos related illnesses, which people are suffering from today, could have been avoided if action was taken many years ago.

It is difficult to swallow the facts and figures surrounding asbestos use. Thousands of people are waking up to the fact that their professional lives as many as 30 or 40 years ago were in fact contributing to an early and painful death.

Asbestos was once hailed as a fantastic, revolutionary material and its fire resistant properties were ideal for use in the construction industries, in plumbing and ship building. Asbestos was installed in buildings throughout the world and many hundreds of thousands of men, women and children came into constant contact with it. Whilst it is not dangerous when lying untouched, it becomes deadly when its’ fibres are disturbed. People working in these industries are most at risk of contracting these diseases however; their families are also at risk of becoming ill at some point in the future. Barry Welch died at the age of 32 because he came into contact with asbestos dust when he was a child. His stepfather came home each night covered in the deadly fibres.

A large number of employers have now admitted liability for the suffering of their previous employees. Protection was not offered to many of the people who are now living with asbestosis, mesothelioma, emphysema, pleural plaques and lung cancer. It has been discovered that many employers continued to expose workers, even though they had become aware of the inherent risks.

Many people suffering from lung diseases as a result of their employers’ negligence have received injury compensation payouts as a result of their contact with a personal injury solicitor. Tracing previous employers and attributing liability is difficult, but people suffering because of another person’s action are legally entitled to make an injury claim for the suffering caused by their work accident.

Unfortunately, new legislation has recently been passed which may mean an end to large compensation payouts for families of asbestos disease sufferers. Britain’s highest court ruled that where a worker was exposed to asbestos dust by several employers, each was liable to pay only a proportionate share of compensation rather than the whole amount. Because many of the employers responsible for fatal asbestos exposure were operating as many as 40 years ago they may now no longer exist or cannot be traced.

Employers union the TUC is calling for the reversal of what it calls a cruel and unjust decision. Many people who may have received hundreds of thousands of pounds in compensation may now only receive a fraction of this amount.

If you are suffering from an asbestos related illness then you may wish to discuss your options with a personal injury solicitor who has specialist knowledge of industrial diseases.

Author: Katy Lassetter, Online personal injury compensation claim specialists, with a 97% claim success rate. Call 0800 197 32 32 or visit the-claim-solicitors.co.uk the-claim-solicitors.co.uk for more details.

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