Pink Cancer Sucks Pinback Button, 2  1/4"

Cancer Sucks! 

Any way you look at it, cancer is a devastating diagnosis.  It becomes even more so when you are diagnosed with a form of cancer that you never even knew was a remote possibility for a man.  I'm referring to male breast cancer.  Go ahead; ask yourself or a man in your life.  I'll venture to say that 90-95% will say, "There's no such thing, breast cancer is a woman's disease," or, "I never knew that!"  That was the overwhelming response I received when I started talking about my husband's diagnosis.

Approximately 2030 men in the United States will be diagnosed with breast cancer in 2008.  For every 100 women with breast cancer,  one man will develop the disease and most of those men will be not only devastated but shocked and surprised.

Is 2030 men an epidemic?  No, but in 2005 when my husband was diagnosed the statistic was 1200-1600 men!  At that point he was already Stage IV with metastasis to his lungs and bones.  In the last 3 years he has undergone a lumpectomy, removal of 19 lymph nodes, a modified radical mastectomy, bone biopsy, monthly chemo treatments, radiation treatments, daily hormone therapy (which quit working after one year), 2 surgeries to his lungs, a metastatic brain tumor which required more surgery, more radiation treatments, 9 months of weekly chemo and most recently 4 (oops! make that 20 and if you're interested in how that happened read my blog) new brain tumors which will require Gamma Knife surgery and a change in his chemo.  The numbers seem small in the scheme of things but when it's your loved one it's no small deal and the mere fact that the numbers continue to rise each year is extremely troublesome.  We need to find a cure soon!

October was Breast Cancer Awareness Month, with all of the ubiquitous pink ribbons and almost all of the infomation geared toward women.  If you look deep enough you can find information about the disease in men but it can be a struggle.  Statistics also show that more men will die from breast cancer than women because they are typically diagnosed at a late stage. 

It is my goal to make everyone aware that breast cancer is not a disease that affects only women. 

The chances for successful treatment and survival are best when breast cancer is found in it's earliest stages. 

Please spread the word!  Help bring male breast cancer Out of the Shadow of Pink!

$0.50 from the sale of each pin will be donated to the Climb for Hope.  "Climb for Hope was organized to raise and channel funds towards targeted and promising research in the fight against breast cancer."  Their mission is to find a viable treatment for breast cancer by 2009.

We have been given permission to list this item by the owner of the trademark (cancersuckscom). CANCER SUCKS is a proprietary trademark of Cancer Sucks, Inc. as evidenced by U.S. Trademark Registration No. 3,222,693 issued by the United States Patent and Trademark Office.

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