On Symmetry and Breast Cancer:

I have a thing about symmetry. Not an obsession. Pictures have hung crooked for months before I've gotten around to straightening them. I just like symmetry. Even lines. Boxes and rectangles. Equilateral triangles. Balance of form. Maybe it is the artist in me? Maybe I didn’t get my fair share of something as a kid and I‘m still trying it even it out? Who knows? But I like symmetry.

I like formal gardens. Patchwork quilts. Steps and stairs. Jigsaw puzzles. Don’t get me wrong I like the riot of stars in the night sky and the puzzle of pictures there. Wild flowers growing in a field. Clouds floating in an open sky. But the perfect roundness of bubbles. The concentric circles in a body of water when an object breaks the surface. Symmetry. Evenness. Balance.

I like my face with the exception of my ears but only because one it higher then the other. I’m okay with my body, over weight that it is and I am making changes for the better there too. Also in doing so I get the symmetry of repetition in exercise. Working one side then the other. But I am having a problem with my boobs. After the breast cancer operation and treatments I was left with two different size boobs. And before you ask, no, I wouldn’t consider surgery. Every time I look down I see the difference. Yes, I have a fake boob enhancement but I don’t like the plastic against my skin for long periods of time. I’m into comfort more then symmetry but this thing is getting to me. How do I come to terms with this? The more weight I loose the worse it gets. How do I love this uneven scarred thing on my chest? Is it the lack of symmetry or something deeper that I hate?

I try to keep my chin up in more ways then one. But I still have yet to find a comfort zone in this.

Yes, I know that I should be happy that I still have two breasts. But I have a thing about symmetry you see.