Someone once said that Frida Kahlo’s work was like ‘a ribbon around a bomb.’ If Frida Kahlo was around today, that ribbon would be pink.

As you know, The Missability Website has turned Pink for October.

My Dad’s mother died of breast Cancer about nine months before I was born. I never knew her but have always felt connected to the memory of her. She is the only other person in my family who had arthritis. On bad days at work (she was a nurse) she would come home and play the Piano to offload – again, this is something I did all my life when I lived in the same house as a Piano.

I also have her name as my middle name – Valerie.

I expect most of us are in a position where we know someone who has or who has had breast Cancer. But I wonder how it must have been in 1979 for Valerie when it still wasn’t talked about, when we didn’t have a language for being open about illness. I imagine it was certainly lonelier to have breast Cancer at that time.

And I think we still have a long way to go before it truly becomes acceptable to talk openly about illness, but the breast Cancer awareness movement does a lot to open doors in that way.

What I think is so successful about organisations like the pink ribbon foundation, breast Cancer care etc. is the social element of the work. While they provide medical advice and practical resources, there is also a massive commitment to providing emotional support.

I think it is great that we have so many articles about breast Cancer that focus on the whole person’s experience as well as the medical specifics, that we have so many social events that are practical and supportive, that we have so many charities and resources available and that there are so many ways to show your support for the cause.

I found a lump last year that luckily turned out to be a benign fibrodenema, but in the nervous time of waiting for results I was comforted by the knowledge that a wealth of support existed should I find I had Cancer. I was very slow to receive or identify support for myself re: Arthritis, preferring to soldier along in pain. I was convinced that unless someone could take away the soreness, there was nothing anyone could do. When I did eventually find support it was amazing. Years in the health care system can be very dis-empowering and depressing. Waiting on results, meeting with busy Consultants who perhaps don’t explain things well or give you the reassurance that’s desperately needed, reacting badly to new medications or being told a health professional has made a mistake with your information can all add to the sense of powerlessness that accompanies pain and illness. Given this, organisations like the Expert Patient Programme or other initiatives set up specifically to empower patients and give them tools to get what they need out of the healthcare system can only be a good thing.

So today I am going to I Knit London to Knit a Tit today. All the money goes towards Breakthrough Breast Cancer. But as well as raising money, any event that puts cake, knitting, solidarity and craft together as a response to illness or suffering is something I want to be a part of. If Missability is about anything, it’s about responding in a practical, loving, solid, creative way to circumstances and finding a way to chuck love at life’s pain.