Mothers Day Classic
I'm just back from running in the Mothers Day Classic. It is raising money for breast cancer research which I am obviously in favour of, but I hated it. I don't mean any offence to anyone and I think it would be a good thing for people who are honouring their friend or relative who has passed away but for me personally as a survivor I found it horribly annoying.
There was naturally lots of pink and lots of people wore these tribute cards pinned to their back saying they were running for whoever. There was no option of having a card for yourself. Well, you hand-wrote whatever you wanted on them so I guess you could have, but that wasn't the idea. I'm not sure if they were all for people had passed away or for survivors and people currently in treatment as well. But they were called tribute cards which suggests they weren't for living people.
So, the basic impression the whole thing gave was that people with cancer are pathetic and weak and probably going to die. This is obviously not true, and I'm sure people would argue that this was not the impression the day was giving. But for me personally that is how it made me feel.
I would just have liked some acknowledgment that we weren't all touched by breast cancer by knowing someone but that some of us actually were the cancer patients ourselves. And, while tragically people do die of breast cancer most of us won't and will go on to live happy full lives.
