Last night we attended an event up in Texas called BRA. And yes, I spelled it right. The letters stand for Breast Reconstruction Awareness. The event was held at a UTMB facility, and the turnout was way more than they expected. They even ran out of the entry giveaway bags and t-shirts.
The night started with a trip down vendor row. There we did each get a free bag. Chris got a pink fanny pack. I got a very creative shopping-style bag that collapses inside itself to about the size of a baseball. I also grabbed two of the stress balls. One was shaped like a pink heart. The other was my favorite, though. It was offered by the UTMB Office of Innovation. It was shaped like a light bulb. Get it? Innovation. Ideas. Light bulb over your head. Genius!
They had a full spread buffet of Mexican food. I had a tamale and a piece of quesadilla. There were a few other things I tried as well, but they weren’t as … memorable.
The program itself was interesting at times, emotional at times, and downright boring at times. Chris’ doctor led off the proceedings. She has one of those very soft voices, so I didn’t hear a word she said. A new plastic surgeon then spoke. In true doctor form, he “wowed” the crowd with an in-depth description of a breast reconstruction surgery. Too many technical terms for me to follow, for sure. That would be the boring part.
The emotional part involved the stories. Several ladies shared their journey with breast cancer and how they have been helped in their recovery.
And the interesting, at least to me, was learning some of the “little things” that are involved in helping women who are survivors of breast cancer resume normal lives. There was even a nurse practitioner who told about her journey to learn how to do tattoos so she could do a tattoo to replace a missing nipple. Never would have thought about that.
Other than the door prizes, the main event came when six or eight big, burly men - including several police officers and a doctor - one at a time paraded down a red carpet runway wearing (on top of their clothes, and in one case on top of his bulletproof vest) bras. But not just any article of women’s underwear. These had been garishly decorated to look like everything from a piñata to something you might see in a Las Vegas showroom. It was all in good fun, and left everyone laughing, for sure, as the guys all strutted their way down the runway.
All in all it was a pretty impressive evening. Only change needed? Chairs! We both could have used one, for sure.
Philippians 4:9 says, Do what you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, and the God of peace will be with you.
Father, thank you for the folks who are putting in time and even careers to walk with women through the different stages of their breast cancer experience. Bless them for that. And be with those women who have been affected by breast cancer. Walk with them in their journeys. Amen.
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