Member-only story
It’s OK To Be Fat. It’s OK To Be Thin.
It’s not OK to be cruel
Eighteen years ago I was first diagnosed with inflammatory breast disease. It’s a very aggressive form of cancer. My oncologist told me I had about 6 months to live. I did my own research and, sure enough, only 15% of people diagnosed with this type of breast cancer survived more than 18 months.
Yet I survived.
Once I was in remission, I enrolled in graduate school. Instead of engineering, which is what I majored in prior to cancer, I decided to try something different — history. Something I’d always been interested in.
For the most part, I had a great experience. I enjoyed the coursework and most of my professors were great. So were many of my classmates.
But not all of them.
You see, I gained a significant amount of weight during chemotherapy and radiation. And my right breast, the one that had gotten the radiation treatment, was now much smaller than my left breast. My chest was misshapen.
And a few of my fellow grad students were not particularly mature or kind.
I overheard some of their comments on several occasions.
The first couple of times, it hurt my feelings. Plus, it was unfair. It wasn’t my fault I was fat! The cancer…
