Ricki’s Family History of Breast Cancer: Being Black with Breast Cancer

Ricki’s breast cancer diagnosis inspired her to make breast cancer prevention in the Black community her life’s mission. She wants other Black women to talk about their family history and understand their breast cancer risk. 

Audio Descriptive Text

• Super comes up with “Ricki On being Black with breast cancer”
• Clips of Ricki sitting and being interviewed are shown throughout the video.
• A photo of Ricki and her mom is shown.
• Ricki’s family photos are shown.
• A photo of Ricki is shown.
• A photo of Ricki during treatment is shown.
• Photos of Ricki with friends and her mom are shown.
• A photo of Ricki with her granddaughter is shown.
• Super comes up with “It’s Time to Talk About Breast Cancer Risk”
• The last screen shows “BRING YOUR BRAVE” with the logos for the National Association for Chronic Disease Directors and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and directs viewers to visit: cdc.gov/bringyourbrave

Script

[Ricki] I was fifty-five when I got diagnosed with Triple Negative breast cancer. When I told my mom, she immediately cried and she actually blamed herself. And she said, “The worst fear I’ve ever had is passing breast cancer down to you.” My mom was 50 when she was diagnosed with Stage Zero breast cancer. But she didn’t really think about cancer in our family until I got sick. And I said, “Mommy, do we have anybody that we know with breast cancer?” And then that’s when it hit her that her aunt had died of breast cancer. And then I said, “Well, how did your grandmother die?” And she said “A female cancer.” And I said, “Well what does that mean, mommy?” And she said, “Well, you know, my mother didn’t really talk about it.” But that’s typical of black families. We just don’t talk about health. And that’s because a lot of black moms are single moms or the breadwinners for their family. And so they don’t wanna talk about disease and tell people they’re sick because they’ll make them afraid that they can’t take care of them. And we have to get over that. We have to know about who had a disease before us in another generation. It could help save lives and keep people from dying. So a year to the date that I was diagnosed, the cancer came back. My doctor said, “Get your affairs in order, Ricki. “You have two years to live.” And that was 10 years ago. So I’m very blessed. My life’s mission is to eradicate black breast cancer. And it’s really based on my three-and-a-half year old granddaughter. The way I look at it, she’s gonna get boobs in about 10 years and I don’t want her to ever think about breast cancer. So I got 10 years to do this work.