Yesterday, as we were posting the excellent video project artist Gregg Deal (Pyramid Lake Paiute) has been cooking up, he was taking note of the chaos in Canada near Rexton, New Brunswick. He was inspired to make the poster below, which he offers as a free, open source image for anyone who cares to show solidarity with the protestors. Suitable for Facebook and Twitter posts, profile photos, or even framing — right-click or ctrl-click (Mac) to download it in high resolution (file is 1728 x 2592 pixels, 1.19 MB):
EVERETT — While a number of other health agencies throughout Snohomish County are able to specialize in diagnosing and treating certain parts of breast cancer, many of them refer their support services to the Providence Regional Cancer Partnership.
Mary Gallagher and Nicola Mucci, who work in patient support services at the Providence Regional Cancer Partnership, noted that Providence provides not only diagnostic services, surgery, chemotherapy and radiation, but also support services such as counseling, support groups, massage, acupuncture, yoga and dietician services. Many of these services are integrated to ensure that Providence is caring for patients’ minds and bodies at the same time.
“Patient support services offer a more holistic approach to health care,” Mucci said. “Patients can work with our teams and take advantage of our resources to address the emotional aspects of what they’re going through.”
“Relationships have become a focus for us lately,” Gallagher said. “We’re looking at how women with breast cancer and their families are adapting to the new circumstances that they’re all facing, the patients and their loved ones alike. How do they deal with these new emotions?”
Mucci explained that, because there is such a wide variety of experiences that cancer patients and their families can face, Providence’s menu of support groups includes not only a general cancer survivors group, but also therapy groups, groups for patients in the advanced stages of cancer, two groups for breast cancer patients — one set aside specifically for younger patients — and a support group for cancer survivors.
“Younger breast cancer patients are going to be facing issues that are less relevant to women who are 45 years and older,” Mucci said. “Younger women need to know how to deal with breast cancer when they still have young children at home, and how to balance their family, career and health concerns. There are also going to be issues tied to sexuality and intimacy with their partners, as well as the shock of being diagnosed with breast cancer at a younger age.”
Mucci added that, regardless of whether the support groups are specific to younger or older cancer patients, family members are always welcome to attend, and indeed, Gallagher pointed out that many aspects of cancer impact the patients’ families as hard as the patients themselves.
“The idea is to let patients know that they have that emotional support at every stage of their journeys,” Gallagher said. “At the same time, we try to help those patients’ caregivers manage their own stress levels. Simple tasks such as balancing the checkbook and doing the laundry become much more challenging when they’re undergoing treatment, so especially if the caregivers are the adult children of the patients, they need to learn to be patient with their parents.”
Between scheduling appointments, providing transportation, picking up medications and running errands such as grocery shopping for their loved ones, Gallagher estimated that caregivers can easily find themselves saddled with an extra 20 hours of work per week.
“To keep them from overextending themselves and burning out, we teach them how to ‘Share the Care,’” Gallagher said. “If they can get help from their own families and friends, and disperse those tasks, it lightens the load on everyone.”
Caregivers have more than one support group devoted to their needs at Providence, with one group addressing the concerns of individual caregivers, while the “Share the Care” support group is tailored toward those who act as caregivers to cancer patients in groups. While the individual caregiver support group teaches caregivers how to take care of themselves in addition to seeing to those with cancer, the “Share the Care” support group trains groups on how to give care to cancer patients as teams.
“What’s new in how we’re helping caregivers is that we’re acknowledging that everyone in the family is affected by cancer, not just the patient,” Mucci said.
“The family is the patient,” Gallagher said. “Patients who are used to living independent, private lives need to learn how to open up to others. At the same time, they need to have self-esteem and feel good about themselves. The mind and the body are so interwoven that we can experience stresses as physical sensations.”
The Providence Regional Cancer Partnership’s scope of programs related to patients’ well-being is also expansive enough to include social workers, financial management, childcare, elder care, chaplains and psychologists.
The Providence Regional Cancer Partnership is located at 1717 13th St. in Everett. For more information, log onto www.cancerpartnership.org.
Halloween is almost here. Time for everyone to start picking out their costumes.
Many children and adults across the country wear culturally based costumes such Pocahatas, terrorist, and more.
This controversial topic has been discussed many times in the past. But each year the costumes still remain.
In 2011 students at Ohio University started a campaign – “We’re a Culture, Not a Costume“. They produced a series of posters to help raise awareness of this issue.
THIRTEEN Productions in association with WNET launched their third interactive game in the Mission US series which immerses players in U.S. history content through free interactive games. The third mission features Little Fox, a Northern Cheyenne boy whose life is changed by the encroachment of white settlers, railroads, and U.S. military expeditions. As buffalo diminish and the U.S. expands westward, players experience the Cheyenne’s persistence through conflict and national transformation.
“‘A Cheyenne Odyssey’ is the first game to present the Northern Cheyenne perspective on real events our people experienced,” said Dr. Richard Littlebear, President of Chief Dull Knife College and advisor to the project. “However, this is much more than a game about the high and low points of our history. It teaches students how to make decisions and how to live with the consequences of those decisions, just as one has to do in real life.”
Content for “A Cheyenne Odyssey” was developed by historians and educators at the American Social History Project (ASHP)/Center for Media & Learning, a research center at the Graduate Center, City University of New York, in close collaboration with representatives of the Northern Cheyenne Tribe at Chief Dull Knife College , a community-based and tribally-managed institution located on the Northern Cheyenne reservation in southeastern Montana. Dr. Littlebear and his colleagues consulted on educational content, scripting, design, and casting for the game.
To find out more about the game and how to play visit the Mission US website
October is National Breast Cancer Awareness Month and Friday, October 18, is National Mammography Day. Here are eight things the American Cancer Society wants you to know about breast cancer:
1. A woman’s chance of developing breast cancer is 1 in 8.
2. All women are at risk for breast cancer.
3. An estimated 232,340 new cases are expected to be diagnosed in women in the United States this year.
4. Men can get breast cancer too: About 2,240 men will be diagnosed with breast cancer in 2013.
5. Breast cancer is the most frequently diagnosed non-skin cancer in women.
6. About 40,030 breast cancer deaths are expected in 2013.
7. Stay healthy: maintain a healthy weight, exercise, and reduce alcohol consumption.
8. Early detection saves lives; the American Cancer Society recommends yearly mammograms starting at age 40.
Schedule a mammogram today. It could save your life. If you need help paying for a mammogram, contact the American Cancer Society at 1.800.227.2345 or visit http://www.cancer.org.
Chris Bickford for The New York Times Government Reopens After Shutdown: National parks, monuments, museums and federal agencies reopened on Thursday after a 16-day shutdown of the government.
WASHINGTON — The United States government sputtered back to life Thursday after President Obama and Congress ended a 16-day shutdown, reopening tourist spots and clearing the way for federal agencies to deliver services and welcome back hundreds of thousands of furloughed workers.
Across the country, the work and play of daily life, stalled for more than two weeks, resumed at federal offices, public parks, research projects and community programs. Museums opened their doors. Federal money for preschool programs started flowing again. Scientists at the South Pole began ramping up their work.
And the National Zoo’s panda cam flickered on again (though a flood of online visitors soon crashed it).
For Shafiqullah Noory, on his first trip to the United States from Afghanistan, the legislative deal came just when he needed it. Sitting on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, admiring the view of the Washington Monument, he said he knew why Abraham Lincoln had been an important leader.
“If you have the unity, you have the prosperity,” he said. “And then everything comes after that.”
In Boston, tourists once again spilled into the Charlestown Navy Yard, the national historic park that contains the Constitution, the world’s oldest commissioned warship afloat. Among them was Dorothy Bank, a retired kindergarten teacher from North Carolina, who was just about to leave Boston for a foliage tour in New England.
“I was hoping it would be open; we didn’t know whether it would be in time,” she said, noting the uncertainty of the legislative fight in Washington. Of the ship, she said, “I like it as a part of history.”
In New York City, office workers poured in and out of the mammoth building at 26 Federal Plaza in Lower Manhattan, eager to start working — and be paid — again. “Put yourself in that situation,” said Regina Napoli, 60, a legal administrator who had been furloughed from her job with the Social Security Administration. “The bills pile up.”
Washington’s Metro trains were once again packed with federal workers streaming in from suburban Maryland and Virginia, government IDs dangling from lanyards around their necks. Robert Lagana said Thursday morning that he was eager to get back to his job at the International Trade Commission.
“It beats climbing the walls, wondering where your next paycheck is going to be and how you’re going to make your bills,” Mr. Lagana said. “They really need to come up with a law where this never happens again.”
Meanwhile, those arriving at the Environmental Protection Agency headquarters in Washington were met by none other than Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr., being boisterous, as usual. “I brought some muffins!” Mr. Biden said as he arrived at the security desk, greeting employees with handshakes and hugs.
And at the White House, President Obama took a moment to speak directly to federal workers, saying: “Thanks for your service. Welcome back. What you do is important. It matters.”
The government’s top personnel officer announced just before 1 a.m. Thursday that officials should restart normal functions “in a prompt and orderly manner.” Those few words were enough to kick-start the government. A memorandum from officials at the Department of the Interior encouraged returning workers to check their e-mail and voice mail, fill out their timecards and “check on any refrigerators and throw out any perished food.”
But not everything was back to normal immediately. In Chicago, people who had been waiting to visit the Internal Revenue Service office since the shutdown began were still turned away by security. “If you aren’t making a payment, they won’t see you,” said an officer in the lobby, who suggested they try again on Friday.
Cynthia Ellis, a South Side resident, needed to get federal tax documents for a state program that helps pay her mortgage. “I heard the news say all government employees are back to work,” she said, clearly frustrated. “This is bad. This is really bad.”
The agreement extending federal borrowing power, hammered out at the last moment in Washington, paves the way for another series of budget negotiations. Conservative Republicans in the House and Senate vowed to renew their fight for cuts in spending and changes to the Affordable Care Act.
Across the globe, investors shrugged at the decision by United States politicians to end the shutdown. On Wall Street, stocks were mixed in part on reports of disappointing earnings from I.B.M.
At the Capitol, lawmakers immediately began post-shutdown posturing as they braced for another confrontation in the budget negotiations that are set to begin in the days and weeks ahead.
“We’ve got to assure the American people that we are not going to do this again,” Senator John McCain, Republican of Arizona, said Thursday on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.”
For some people across the country, the political debate remained raw. In Oak Ridge, Tenn., where the shutdown was set to furlough about 3,600 employees at the Y-12 National Security Complex, Dean Russell said he had no plans to do away with the sign he posted at the entrance of his restaurant: “Members of Congress not welcome here.”
Even in deeply conservative Tennessee, Mr. Russell said his edict applied to both parties, who are now barred from the restaurant’s selection of apple, chocolate and coconut fried pies.
“I’m sure the anger will pass, and I’ll take it down,” Mr. Russell said. “But we’ll keep the sign because I’m sure they’ll do something again.”
But others were just happy that the shutdown was over.
At the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area, north of Los Angeles, Bonnie Clarfield, a supervisory park ranger, spent Thursday morning taking down the closed signs — 16 of them in all — and cleaning up after vandals who had ripped some of them down and in some cases posted signs of their own.
She found one handwritten sign that read, “Congress Can’t Shut Down the Park,” while some official park signs announcing the closing were strewn in the bushes.
“We had a lot of vandalism of infrastructure,” she said. “People were frustrated, and they were taking it out on the rangers. We were doing our jobs, and they were taking it out on the messengers. I feel great today. No one’s been mad at me.”
Federal officials said the lingering impact of the shutdown should begin to dissipate in the coming days as agencies reopen fully and begin taking stock.
Sean Hennessey, a spokesman for the National Park Service, said 85 furloughed employees were back to work in Boston. He estimated that the city’s national historical sites, which include the navy yard, the Bunker Hill Monument and the downtown Faneuil Hall visitor center, lost about 55,000 visitors because of the shutdown.
The U.S.S. Constitution Museum alone, he said, lost an estimated $7,000 per day.
Reporting was contributed by Jess Bidgood from Boston, Alan Blinder from Oak Ridge, Tenn., J. David Goodman from New York, Emmarie Huetteman from Washington, Ian Lovett from Thousand Oaks, Calif., and Steven Yaccino from Chicago.
November 13, 2013, 5-7pm, Tulalip Administration Building Room 263Learn Systems and Techniques for safety utilizing surface supplied air for the commercial diverDinner providedRSVP, Higher Education 360.716.4888 or highered@tulaliptribes-nsn.gov
Walkers turned out in force for last year’s ‘Making Strides Against Cancer’ in Everett, to raise funds for programs and services to detect, treat, research and hopefully ultimately cure cancer. — image credit: Courtesy Photo
EVERETT — The American Cancer Society will be “Making Strides Against Cancer” again this year, from 9 a.m. to noon on Sunday, Oct. 20, in Everett, and event organizers and participants alike hope to recruit as many fellow members of the community as they can, to help continue the ACS’s progress in dealing with this disease.
Jerri Wood, a specialist with mission delivery for the Great West Division of ACS in Everett, explained that Making Strides aims to enlist 200 teams in meeting an income goal of $165,000 this year, and as of the last week in September, they were just shy of 90 teams who’d raised slightly more than $40,000. She elaborated that Making Strides helps fund a variety of services for breast cancer patients, including Citrine Health of Everett, which has made a mission out of providing not only free bras and breast prostheses for post-mastectomy patients, but also fittings for both.
“I met one woman who’d been using an old washrag in her bra, and she said, ‘You mean I could have had a real boob?’” Wood said. “It’s important for your spine and neck to try and maintain the weight balance that you had, and Citrine Health helps people with the paperwork, and to see if they qualify for Medicaid or Medicare.”
Another service which Making Strides helps to support is the American Cancer Society’s own “Reach to Recovery,” which utilizes cancer survivors as a resource to guide those who have just been diagnosed with cancer through the journey of dealing with the disease.
“If you’ve been a cancer survivor for one year, we can train you to be a coach to newly diagnosed cancer patients, so that they can look at you and see that you’ve made it through what they’re about to go through,” said Wood, who added that the ACS works to match survivors and newly diagnosed patients based on criteria such as their ages and types of cancer. “Being diagnosed with cancer doesn’t have to feel like a death sentence.”
Wood also touted the American Cancer Society’s “Road to Recovery,” which eases the burden on cancer patients’ families by providing patients with free transportation to treatment, as well as the ACS hotline at 800-227-2345, which is staffed 24 hours a day, seven days a week to answer questions about treatment options and locating resources, as well as simply providing some small measure of comfort.
“We have people call at 2 a.m. who are coming up on their yearly mammograms and are worried that they’ll find something,” Wood said. “We also have a number of survivors who finish their treatments and find themselves wondering what their purpose in life is. By volunteering to give rides to other folks who are fighting cancer, they can give something back.”
In the meantime, Making Strides offers walkers throughout the region an opportunity to raise funds for all these programs, while also learning about other services, such as the Providence Regional Cancer Partnership’s Survivorship Series and the YMCA’s exercise classes tailored toward those coping with cancer.
“Besides the on-site educators, we’ll even have the American College of Cosmetology offering a two-hour class on cosmetics for cancer patients, including how to draw in your own eyebrows after your hair has fallen out,” Wood said.
Making Strides drew an estimated 1,000 attendees last year, and this year’s kickoff at the Snohomish County Courthouse Plaza, located at 3000 Rockefeller Ave. in Everett, is drawing walkers from as for north as Arlington, including Kerry Munnich, who’s chaired that city’s Relay For Life for the American Cancer Society for multiple years.
“This is our fourth year of coming to Making Strides,” said Munnich, captain of “Friends for a Cure,” an eight-member team made up of women from Arlington and Marysville. “We’re here for our friend Bobbi McFarland, a breast cancer survivor. Most of us have known each other since elementary school. The rest of us met up in middle school and high school. Point being, we’ve all known each other for a really long time.”
Munnich explained that she and her friends walk in Making Strides and Relay For Life not only to raise funds for programs and services to detect, treat, research and hopefully ultimately cure cancer, but also to raise awareness about cancer-related issues.
“We want to get people thinking about early detection, to nip it in the bud in time,” Munnich said. “Each year’s walks are powerfully emotional celebrations, and it’s one of the easiest things that you can do to make a difference, so why wouldn’t you do it?”
For more information on this year’s Making Strides, log onto its website at
NEB Hearings start in Toronto today, here’s what they won’t be hearing.
A banner drop and a series of gaged protestors demonstrated what is being left out of the National Energy Board (NEB) hearings that are taking place this week in Toronto. The subject of the hearings is Enbridge’s Line 9 reversal and expansion proposal, which would allow the company to ship tar sands bitumen from Sarnia to Montreal. Groups today protested the fact that the hearings have explicitly banned discussion of upstream and downstream impacts of the pipeline reversal and expansion, which would allow the tar sands to expand production and refining.
“Stop Line 9: tar sands = industrial genocide” read a large banner that hung from the Metro Convention Centre’s steps. “We want to remind people that Line 9 is one battle of a larger fight against the most destructive project on the planet, which has already transformed an area the size of Florida into what’s termed a ‘sacrifice zone’,” said Vanessa Gray, an Anishnaabe kwe organizer with Aamjiwnaang and Sarnia Against Pipelines. “The tar sands have been termed a ‘slow industrial genocide’ by the native people living downstream, but this term also applies to people living near the refining of this toxic substance. My people are dying from this industry.”
Aamjiwnaang First Nation has 63 chemical refineries within 50 km of the community. Community-monitoring has reported that 40 per cent of the population required inhalers to breath and 39 per cent of women had experienced miscarriages.
Other groups participating in the action highlighted the increased contribution to climate change that Enbridge’s proposal would entail.
“Approving the transport of diluted bitumen means expanding tar sands production which will be a disaster for the planet, said Lyn Adamson Co Chair Canadian Voice of Women for Peace. “These hearings do not replace the need for an environmental assessment. A National Energy Board should be considering alternatives, such as renewable energy and conservation.”
In addition to restricting who could speak at the hearings, the Omnibus Bill C-38 restricted what those individuals could say in the National Energy Board hearing, restricting discussion on tar sands production or refining.
There will be a large rally against Line 9 at the NEB hearings this Saturday, Oct 19 outside the National Energy Board hearings.
