The Roy Castle Lung Cancer Foundation runs a campaign called Women Against Lung Cancer, which aims to raise awareness about lung cancer in women.
This year we are asking all women affected by lung cancer to upload their picture to our website with one sentence explaining “Why I am a Woman Against Lung Cancer”.
All the pictures will eventually be turned into a giant flag which we will be unveiling at the Windsor 8k women-only race on October 6th.
All you need to do is send a picture of yourself to emma.gunby@roycastle.org and a line of text about why you are a Woman Against Lung Cancer, so for example mine is “My grandfather died from lung cancer & now I work for a lung cancer charity as I want to make a difference”.
Finally, please let us know if you would be interested in attending the unveiling, and/or taking part in the race, in Windsor on October 6th?
Thanks in advance.
Emma
Written by
EmmaG
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20 Replies
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Hi Emma,
you've got my picture. just got to think of a slogan.
Well I'd like to, but unfortunately I'm a bloke. I have a real hard time with support groups that discriminate against people because of their gender. Dealing with the stigma of lung cancer and lack of support is hard enough without this. Worse still is that it affects my children as well, excluding my son but not my daughter.
I know this isn't the only group, Cancer Research being the biggest, but come on, we can do better than this. I'd love to take part in an inclusive, non-competitive event with all of my family; not least because I'm missing half my lung now.
Hello boomer i live in grimsby and we have a very good support group here it is the first wednesday in the month we have a lot of men come we have a good old natter and a light lunch you should ask if you have a support group at your hospital there is plenty of support for lung cancer these,s days and Boomer i also have half of my lung removed it is 10 years now and i feel so very lucky hope your feeling well June
I agree that we need to be united in this to get our voice heard, in reality this is only a small part of a much bigger picture.
It is not exclusively for, or about women. You could be a women wanting to be a voice for your husband/father /brother/son, or a man wanting to support your wife/sister/mother/daughter. Its just an angle to try and get some support and get the Lung Cancer's voice to be heard. Look at the support breast cancer gets, 20 years ago the 5 year survival for breast cancer was 50% its now 95%, if women have that much power why not get them on board for the lung cancer cause? Are women better at raising awareness??
Emma's line was was “My GRANDFATHER died from lung cancer & now I work for a lung cancer charity as I want to make a difference”. where in that statement does it say this is just for women?
This campaign is about everyone with lung cancer irrespective of gender, its just an angle to get lung cancer in the limelight that's all.
Just another thought on this... My husband a life long non smoker has lung cancer.... they are lots of people out there who have NEVER smoked and have got lung cancer...(he is also under 40, also has a young family- all other things we have been discriminated for .. cancer is bad enough but to be postively excluded is just downright unfair!).... would there not be better mileage in promoting Lung cancer in Never Smokers..... I really feel for the men in all this.... there is Race for Life- exclusively for women and now this... what did men do that was so bad? I know for one, my husband will feel even more let down and especially buy this Organisation! C'mon Roy Castle folk... you can do better than this.!!
so sorry to hear your news, I am also a never smoker, diagnosed with stage 4 in my 40's. I did some fund raising recently where some men refused to put money in out collection pots as 'I shouldn't have smoked, its was my fault' it wasn't the other men in the group of us collecting that put them right it was the women!
Believe it or not, you are already a 'women against lung cancer' purely by writing what you put in your post. My husband wouldn't have written anything in support of me being a never smoker and getting it, I don't think many men are programmed that way. We do alot of fund and awareness raising since I got this diagnosis but I have to say its the females in the group that are the most proactive.
i totally agree with LRR147. My dad was diagnosed with lung cancer earlier this year and people automatically say, "was he a smoker". My dad has never smoked in his life. There needs to be the awareness that you can get cancer, lung cancer in particular, even if you've never smoked and don't ignore any other signs because of this.
When i first saw this post i did think why is it for women and not just promoting the awareness of lung cancer
I think from my perspectvie..... the title 'Women against lung cancer' says it for me... and you are very right and yes, you are right. I can , as a women, do my bit.. but what about my husband being able to this bit!
He could do what I do, I started a faceboook group and a fund raising page. I have organised sponsored walks , luncheons, dances, a pub crawl some of these are now going to be an annual event whether I'm still here or not. I've even started a support group at my local hospital with the lung cancer nurses as we didn't have one. Your hubby can still do his bit X
Well for a start, the clue is in the name "Women against Lung Cancer" and then there is the aim "to raise awareness of Lung Cancer in women", where are MEN in this? Your right to talk about Breast Cancer, it has massively distorted cancer research (see the excellent article in New Scientist that the Roy Castle site recently linked to and impacts on EVERYONE with Lung Cancer) and support. I really struggled, and failed, to get practical support for thing like mowing the lawn etc that I would have been able to get if I was a women with Breast Cancer in my area.
Lung Cancer is an awful disease, and has a devastating impact on all of my family. We should be raising awareness of lung cancer in all groups, not discriminating against people based on their gender. I suppose, in the end, my fundamental problem is that these sort of campaigns basically say it's ok for my daughter but my son isn't good enough and that's just wrong.
I am and will always be for supprting anyone with lung cancer- it is a horrible illness and one I firmly believe that the Governement firmly ignore... and they do need to sit up and start to make significant changes in the way the research is funded... but thats a whole different issue, that I could write about for weeks, months or even years.....
I just wish a natioanl organisation such as this- would just give men the opportunity to join in... my husbands feels excluded.... and we are all in this horrible pot of lung cancer together... I just feel a bit let down by the Roy Castle guys thats all and a collective voice has to be worth than a subset! After listneing to the race for life... its all of us against cancer.. and having my own two children aged 7 and 9 say.. but it's not all of us mummy -it's just women... this possibly was just another nail in the coffin so to speak.....
I think the work you do is brilliant and applaude you and as a family hugely affected by Lung cancer thank you for the work you do and my husband and I are doing what we cant oraise awareness,however, he is still sick from treatment, sick with the side effects and trying to get well enough to return to work... and spend time with out children who he probably won't see become teenagers and to do the best for us as a family while we still have him... so time is very limited.. but we do do what we can.
This isn't meant against anyone personally- I hope no one thinks that it is... It's about feeling let down and excluded.
Anyway, its Saturday and the sun is shining and we all need to go and enjoy today for today.. because who knows what tomorrow may be bring.
Just one final question for the women who have joined because their grandfather/father/husband/son/brother has or had lung cancer: Why have you joined a group that would have done nothing for them?
The stated aim is "aims to raise awareness about lung cancer in women" so why join this group rather than an inclusive group?
I don't like the way breast cancer charities do women only events and always have women on there posters with pink! MEN get breast cancer too but alot of people don't know that and i think its so sad that men could ignore a lump because they believe that it could not be breast cancer.
No gender should be mentioned, anyone who wants to help should be able to the more the people involved the bigger impact on the awareness.
Points like NON smokers can get lung cancer at ANY age and they need to scrap x rays as they do not show up the cancer until its advance but a ct/pet scan would! Then the 5 yr survival rate would increase dramatically!
People sadly believe that money should not be spent on lung cancer as its a "smokers disease" and is brought on by the people's bad choices they made in life!
I will join, will get thinking and find a nice picture, thats the hard bit!
I can see both sides of the argument but think that any campaign that raises awareness of lung cancer is worthwhile WE are all in it together and if we help even one person whether man or woman its a worthwhile campaign anything that raises awareness has to be a good thing.
Hi all, sorry just catching up with the conversation on here. Thanks for all the feedback on the campaign, which is really helpful for us when we're planning future campaigns. I want to stress this is only one of our campaigns and our organisation provides help and hope for all people. We decided to run this campaign as rates of lung cancer have been increasing among women in the UK and we wanted to highlight to women that this is a disease which can affect them and make them aware of what symptoms to look out for. If you would like to find out more about some of the other campaigns we run you can visit our website at roycastle.org. Also, if you would like to air your views why not come along to our National Supporters Meeting in Birmingham in October? roycastle.org/get-involved/... Hope this helps. Emma
I cannot believe the silly responses to these messages. I was a smoker of 40 years, I gave up only 4 months ago, thinking I could breath easier, how stupid am I. The damage is done. Yes it was my choice, but stop judging people or their gender. Women need reminding whether they smoke or not - we concentrate on only the female cancers, or the male cancers, so we need to be reminded that we are all at risk, whether we smoke or not. Please stop being so defensive about gender and just focus on helping one another - life is so short regardless of how we are affected and by what type of cancer.
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