While I was growing up, October meant my birthday and my mom's homemade Halloween costumes. When I was 21, it became the month Mom found a lump in her breast. The year I turned 23, it was the month I lost my mother to inflammatory breast cancer.

Every October, much of America is draped in pink for National Breast Cancer Awareness Month. But it's not enough to purchase pink kitchen appliances, flip flops, or keychains; we need to look beyond the ribbon and have honest, open talks with the people we love living with this disease.

My mom's lasting gift to her daughters, family and friends was making cancer something you could talk about. She wrote about her journey through breast cancer on a journal she created on CaringBridge.org, a site created for people battling serious illnesses to share the stories.

Read the rest of the story at the Huffington Post.

Click here to read another fascinating news story.

Don’t miss out on MORE great articles like this one. Click here to sign up for our weekly newsletter!