Breast Health as a Witchy Millennial (Originally written November 2017)

Everyone knows that as you get older breast checks become more frequent and necessary in order for women to remain aware of their health. As breast cancer becomes more and more widespread, especially among women of color, the question of when to start annual checks on yourself has arisen in the social circles I’ve been a part of. In my generation, we’ve all just about reached our 30’s in the past year or so, and we’ve all notice many changes in our bodies both good and bad. We’re all, undoubtedly, striving to be healthier in our everyday routines, and started asking the question; when do you start checking your breasts regularly for lumps and irregularities? And how regular is regular? 

According to, WebMD, “You should have a clinical breast exam every one to three years starting at age 20 and every year starting at age 40. A clinical breast exam may be recommended more frequently if you have a strong family history of breast cancer.” http://www.webmd.com/breast-cancer/guide/doctors-breast-exam As a general rule of thumb I think this guideline is amazing, but personally checking yourself should happen more frequently. In all honesty, I never really knew how to check myself until recently. When I felt my breasts I would tell my doctor it all feels lumpy and squishy, so what am I checking for. She’d always laugh at me and agree that things feels a lil textured, but I’d know if I felt a hard lump in my breast. I always secretly feared I’d never know the difference. 

Recently, I’ve had what ended up being a whitehead on my breast. I completely freaked out! It came out of nowhere, looked like nothing I had ever seen a whitehead to be, and had pus coming out of it. I was terrified. I assumed it was the beginning of an issue and googled my way into a near heart attack. This is a mistake! Turns out it was nothing, but it definitely sparked the narrative of this article. 

It made me have to ask myself & my peers if they've ever thought of being checked? Most of them have during a physical, but often never thought about it outside of that or do regular checks on themselves. At 31, I’m often not thinking of breast care because most of us still feel so young and don’t think of it until we’re nearly 40. As eating habits changed over the years and more hormones are found in food and drinks paired with the radiation of our cell phones, women my age are actually a little more susceptible to many more health care issues than our mothers have had to oversee in the past. Coupled with things such as the stresses of altering our bodies physically with different surgeries, and constantly dieting. Our bodies take on WAY more than we could ever imagine. The way we grow up thinking of our bodies directly affects our bodies. What we think and feel, often manifests into diseases. Thus, ultimately leaving our bodies at diss ease. In social circles, it’s often normalized to degrade yourself among friends. This one hates their knees, that ones hates their butt, yet even if it’s countered with a “girl your (fill in the blank) is so beautiful.” It’s usually not at all believed by the person who feels they look less than perfect. It goes in one ear and out the other as if it were never said at all. This behavior is just as toxic as social media, and is often taught from the ones we love. We’re taught to judge ourselves and look to social media, TV, movies, music videos, and influencers to tell us what the next “beauty trend” is. This may have been and can be an expression of one’s self, and an addition to ones beauty, but the way it’s all presented and laid out is, either you have the look or you don’t. Meaning you’re either beautiful and in the know, or you’re not.

Now, this isn’t to say that fashion and beauty brands haven’t widely attempted to show love and appreciation to ALL of the different shapes, sizes, colors, and creeds out there, but that has also just recently been the case. As well as, the fact that not all of them feel this way. There are still an alarming amount of brands, designers, and influencers that will tell you (and your kids) that beauty looks a certain way. This also isn’t to blame it all solely on the media either. It’s the combination of all these things together that put us to our detriment at times causing us to become easily accessible to diseases.

Breast health is important, and should be taken seriously the moment you start developing breasts. We should love them at every size, and rub them frequently for check ups, and heart chakra attention. As your breasts are. merely an outward extension of your heart.