This year, take a bigger step during Breast Cancer Awareness Month.
By Henry Adeleye on October 9, 2010
We're knee-deep into the second week of October, which of course is Breast Cancer Awareness Month. Tons of people are wearing pink to support the cause, spreading awareness every single place you go. The most manly of men are sporting pink socks, shoes, and gloves as they knock each other's heads off on the football field. All is normal in the world. But as with anything, there are ways to do even more. Awareness is great, but you can help cancer fighters and survivors in other ways as well. Here are just three of them:
Help a person fighting the battle.
Research shows that people with breast cancer are helped tremendously by the support they receive from friends and family. Cancer fighters are strong, but the emotional support you can provide tends to help them better adjust to the changes they will endure. A few things you can do in this regard are to visit regularly but keep the visits short, keep in touch, give real and honest compliments, take care of errands, and also offer relief to their caregivers. Small things go a long way.
Volunteer to help spread education.
There are a lot of ways to help spread knowledge and education through volunteering. There should be lots and lots of breast cancer walks and 5Ks you can be a part of. There are also opportunities for you to bring professionals and/or survivors to come to your organization and speak about everything they know and have been through. These are all good ways to channel your efforts to a specific cause that can do more than an isolated group of people can do. Also, helping to educate women on the signs to look for, as well as when and how often to get medical advice is an important task that often gets overlooked. Early detection is always critical.
Raise money to find a cure.
Though the NFL does a great job spreading awareness during October, it was found that they do very little in terms of raising money for cancer research. Finding better ways to treat breast cancer is crucial to the fight. Donate to those on the front lines trying to find the cure. There are many places you can start, including the American Cancer Society and the Breast Cancer Research Foundation. Any little bit helps, even if it's just $1. Together, we can all do just a little more this month for the people who need it.