The Skinny Confidential Him & Her Podcast - #140: Keep A Breast - Breast Cancer: Self Checks, Early Detection, and How To Be Preventative

Episode Date: October 2, 2018

On this episode we sit down with Shaney Jo Darden who is the founder and CCO of the Keep A Breast Foundation. We discuss breast cancer and how to perform self checks. We discuss early detection and how to take preventative measures. To learn more about the Keep A Breast Foundation click HERE To connect with Lauryn Evarts click HERE To connect with Michael Bosstick click HERE Read More on The Skinny Confidential HERE For Detailed Show Notes visit TSCPODCAST.COM To Call the Him & Her Hotline call: 1-833-SKINNYS (754-6697) WOO FOR PLAY is the all natural and organic coconut love oil that is changing the way we have sex. With only 4 all natural ingredients WOO is the perfect personal lubricant to spice up your sex life.  All Him & Her Listeners will receive 20% off your entire order plus free shipping when when visiting www.wooforplay.com & using promo code HIMANDHER at checkout. Capri Blue offers high quality candles, premium home fragrance, and beauty care products. With universal approval from both men and women Capri Blue offers products for everyone. All of Capri Blue's products are made with clean, cruelty free vegan formula. For 20% your entire order at Capri Blue go to capri-blue.com/skinny.  This episode was brought to you by Fabletics. Your new go to for all athletic wear.  Fabletics is offering our listeners an incredible deal you don’t want to miss: Get 2 leggings for only $24 a ($99 value) when you sign up for a VIP membership. Just go to Fabletics.com/skinny to take advantage of this deal now. International shipping is available and there is absolutely no commitment when you purchase your first order!  Fabletics.com/skinny Terms and conditions apply.   

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A very smart cookie. And now Lauren Everts and Michael Bostic are bringing you along for the ride. Get ready for some major realness. Welcome to The Skinny Confidential, him and her. What's up, guys? Welcome back to The Skinny Confidential, him and her show. Happy Tuesday. I'm Lauren Everts.

I am the creator of The Skinny Confidential, which is a cheeky resource for beauty, wellness, and business. And I am the him in the him and her show. My name is Michael Bostic. I am an entrepreneur and brand builder, most recently the CEO of Dear Media, which is a new kind of podcast network focused on female content in the audio space. So this episode is all about boobs. We've done an episode in the past that was all about boob jobs, but this is actually about breast cancer. And we wanted to bring someone on who could showcase the importance of doing self-checks at home. I know there's a lot of women listening to this podcast and tell your friends after this, tell your mom,

tell your grandma how important it is to check yourself. We really get into it with the owner of Keep Abreast that's coming up. But before we get into it, I want to talk to you about what I did with the charity because that was fun. What did you do, Lauren? I think I saw what you did. I know you did the whole casting thing. You had cast chips all over the house. It was in the shower, put on Instagram. I saw, but I don't really get what you did it for. Okay. So what I did is Keep Abreast came over to our condo and she cast my boobs. And one of the boobs cast, so I did two, is going to be auctioned off to a charity so they take the cast and they have a talented artist paint the cast into something that's very on brand for the skinny confidential so whoa whoa whoa let me get this straight someone's going to be

bidding on your breasts no someone's bidding on my breasts we're gonna do we have a user profile or any idea of what this individual is, who this individual is, what types of individuals bid on these things? Don't go run and create a fake Instagram account to bid on my tits, okay? Listen, I'm not bidding on something I already got. So anyways, they're going to decorate the boobs, a talented artist in very TSC colors. So we're going to do like bubble gum, light pink, a little bit of black in there, and then they're going to be bid off to someone and all the proceeds go to charity. So I'm very excited about that. Well, see, I would bid for charity now that you say that.

Okay. All right. Well, put your money where your mouth is. I do have a hard time paying for something that I already have, right? That I sleep next to every night. But for charity, I get it. Should we share the request that you asked? Because I had to make two casts.

I'm hoping some real, real heavy hitting rich dude or dudette comes in and buys them for the charity because they could do some damage for the- Michael requested us to make another cast for his office. It's not going to be his Dear Media office, but he did ask for an extra cast. His cast will be painted very very gothic loud maybe a little heavy metal-esque by a different artist and you still get to bed for charity i'm like an

only child i i can't i never learned to share even though i have two siblings you are bad at sharing like listen you're gonna make when i heard you were doing one i was like get me one too yeah so we did two breast casts i stood in the kitchen and the only part that kind of hurt is when they take the cast off. It felt like I was wearing a giant bandaid. Did you have a couple of little like peach hair fuzz? Yeah, a little hair fuzz. Oh yeah, I had a little hair fuzz. Um, and she like took it off and cut it and she was such an artist. Um, she's the owner of Keep A Breast. Her name is Sh it and she was such an artist um she's the owner of keep abreast her name is shaney and she's incredible she's been doing this for 15 years maybe she'll come and cast me no no no no she's not what's she gonna cast your balls i'm not gonna be bidding for those

sorry babe no one's gonna bid on your balls you'd be surprised let's see any takers if anyone wants to bid on his balls no one's bidding bidding. It's like fucking crickets. Okay. You know what's also going to be displayed in your office, Michael? What? Capri blue candles. Okay. Those things smell good.

Oh, they're so good. So there's really nothing better than a great candle. And you would be surprised because they're actually really hard to find these days. I feel like there's so many different options and brands, but my favorite brand by far is Capri Blue. You guys have seen it all over the Skinny Confidential and also on my Instagram story. I'm always burning them in the backgrounds of my recipes. So now I want to give you the deets on the podcast plus a sweet discount code. So if you're new to Capri Blue candles, you want to start with the Volcano. Okay. This is what I started with. This is still my go-to. I mean, all the scents

are insane, but this one especially is legit. Their candles will all make your house feel like the most cozy situation, but the Volcano is my go-to. It's my favorite one to burn in the room. It's my favorite one to burn in the kitchen. I even like the living room. You can't go wrong here. It's the perfect scent. It's not too overpowering, but it's not underwhelming. You know what I mean? It's kind of like in the middle. And I just feel like choosing a candle is like picking cologne or perfume. You want to get it right because it affects the vibe of everything. You don't want it too strong, but you want it to give a little kick. Anyway, if you're new to Capri Blue, you want to start with the Volcano, in my opinion. It has notes of tropical fruit and this sugary citrus.

My favorite two smells. The Volcano fragrance is familiar. It's inviting. It's fresh. It's powerful. I'm obsessed. Everyone loves it. If you ask them about Capri Blue, I'm sure they'll all say they love the Volcano scent.

Even men love it. I love it. We know, babe. You have like 10 in your office. For me, candles are essential for waking up. You guys know this. In the office and winding down, I actually can't get into life without them. So here's the scoop. Capri Blue candles are premium home fragrance and beauty care. They also have beauty care. That's an important mention. All their products are made in the USA and all their candles are natural soy wax blended formula that's been fine-tuned to give you the ultimate fragrance experience. Just to mention, like I said, their beauty care, it's some bomb perfumes and all their beauty products are made with clean vegan formula that are cruelty-free. If you guys need a gift, this is amazing. Okay. I just got a

set for Jordan. She doesn't know this. I hope she's not listening for her bridal shower. And you can also gift them to a guy. Guys need this. Okay. A guy needs like a great candle and a diffuser, especially in his bathroom and his man cave. We need a lot of help. You guys need so much help. We do. To shop Capri blue candles, go to capri-blue.com slash skinny. That's C-A-P-R-I-dash blue.com slash skinny for 20% off your entire order. That's capri-blue.com slash skinny for 20% off your order. Speaking of vibes. So I've realized for the first time in my life, I had a suspicion,

but I've realized finally that I'm getting old. Getting old. We went to Cross this weekend. Everyone, all the young kids go to Cross and everyone's all excited. We brought a huge group. Cross is this music festival here. How would you describe it? Is it like a techno? Is it house? The setup is amazing. Yes, of course. It's's insane it's so well done the lights everything our friend gillian and mauricio actually run it and uh they do an insane job yeah they put it on but here yeah that's all great that's all good and great but so we're there we're at the festival i'm like okay here's here's the thing i'm gonna get into it i'm gonna run around you know not really my type of music per se but i I try to keep up with it.

Like the night before, I was at a Dropkick Murphys and Flogging Molly concert, which, you know, that's like a little bit, maybe more of my scene. I was at El Pesteo eating prosciutto and melon, having a chocolate biscotti with mint tea. Lauren, we don't need your whole life story. But anyway, so then we go the next day,

switch scenes from like punk metal music to this. I'm like, okay, I'm going to keep up with everybody. I know a lot of the listeners probably like the music that's there. And I get there. Everyone there is like 21, 22. The music, everyone's like screaming and yelling. Like, they're so excited. There's a girl crying because there's music. There's these kids playing, like Nickelodeon cartoons. And I looked around and realized I had no idea about any of the music no idea about any of the people and for the first time I was like I am old and I'm out of touch and then I took him to the back and changed his depends and pushed him out on a wheelchair pretty much I

connected you to your oxygen tank I couldn't believe it I couldn't I didn't know anything I couldn't name a song didn't know who anyone was either. I'm like just super out of it. I thought I was plugged in. Okay. I thought I was in the scene and I took you for oysters and warm bread and he was satisfied. Yeah. I mean, listen, I love our friends. I love that they put this thing on and I love that we went with our friends. But as soon as I got to that table with the warm bread and the wine, I was like, that's, this is maybe more me. And on Sunday, we had a day of rest. We just chilled and read and watched TV. And Michael has been making me watch American Horror Story every night in the dark. And then he rolls over and falls asleep.

What season are we on? Cult. Yeah. It's actually really scary. I don't usually get scared, but this one's scary. Put me to sleep. Okay. Good for you.

Anyways, we should get back to i want to i want to just talk about that tangent is there's anybody else out there that listens to this show dm me sam not the only one i can't be the only one that doesn't know about he loves the dm how do you keep up with all this new music you can't even figure it out i thought the hip-hop stuff moved fast now like this stuff moves even if i was a dj here dj there okay you like to be in bed by nine o'clock now that's what i'm dealing with i'm I'm done. Since this episode is booby-based, let's discuss bras and tanks, okay? But let's talk about affordable ones. So recently I ordered a bunch of sports bras and tanks off Fabletics.

Here's the thing. It's really so affordable that you can't help yourself. And their stuff is so cute. They have leggings. They have tanks. They have bras. And their stuff is so cute. They have leggings, they have tanks, they have bras, and there's these leggings. There's these ones that are so flattering. It's like a black tight legging with a big thick white band. It sort of lays at the hip bone. Kind of a lot of their leggings do. I've worn these specific ones like a hundred times. I wear them all the time. In fact, I wore them all Sunday while I watched American Horror Story and read Jerry Hall's autobiography. Anyway, the leggings come with this vibey black sports

bra that pushes your boobs up. It gives you support. I need support, especially when I'm walking on the treadmill returning emails. Fabletics has all these sets and they're so good, guys. They're like $35 for a set. So you get a bra and leggings for $35, which is nuts. Some of them even come with a tank. If you're going to pick up a tank from Fabletics, definitely get the black Musetta seamless open work tank. It sucks you in. It really sucks my stomach in, and it looks fab with the leggings that I mentioned. So a little bit of background on Fabletics. So it was born in 2013 and co-founded by actress Kate Hudson. I'm sure you've heard of her. You know, she's the stunner in How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days. I mean,

how could you forget that yellow dress? Goldie Hawn, Kurt Russell. Yep, that's her. So the details, how it works. So you take a style pop quiz. I mentioned that I love yoga and black during mine. And then you shop from thousands of styles that are curated for you. You can check out as a guest or become a VIP member. VIP perks are that you get 50% off regular prices, free shipping, and additional perks. I'm very, very into this whole thing for the Skinny Confidential audience because they're flattering and affordable. I love that both. You know this if you're in the Skinny Confidential secret Facebook group. Here's the offer. Let's talk deals and steals. Fabletics is offering our listeners an incredible deal you don't want to miss. Get two leggings for $24, which is a $99 value when you sign up for a

VIP membership. Just go to fabletics.com slash skinny to take advantage of this deal now. That's fabletics.com slash skinny to get two leggings for $24. Also free shipping on orders over $49. International shipping is available and there's absolutely no commitment when you purchase your first order fabletics.com skinny after a close friend was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2000 designer and artist shanie joe darden founded the global non-profit organization the keep a breast foundation she did this to raise awareness of breast cancer and to encourage prevention and early detection among young people. Keep a Breast educates young women about the importance of starting a breast health routine from a young age because knowledge is power, early detection

saves lives, and prevention is the cure. You know I love preventative measures. Their goal is to reduce the rates of breast cancer, not just treat it or find a cure. They also have an app called Check Yourself app. It's a free app that teaches you how to do a breast self-check and allows you to schedule an automatic monthly reminder. I just downloaded it. It's available in six languages. With that, let's welcome Shanie to the podcast. This is the Skinny Confidential, him and her. We're here, we're live. Live, back in the studio. We got my breast casted just now.

Yep. You missed it. Yeah, you missed it. Sorry, Michael. I always miss the best things. He's going to get one for his office, though, so I said that when you're working and you're feeling horny you can just like grab a tit I'm pretty sure that that would never fly in this office and I just wanted to disclaim that that never happens to me I work with a lot of women in the office you can do it at your at-home office yes it'll have to be in the at-home office for sure okay we're gonna cast ask the neighbors yeah yeah yeah exactly we're gonna do your balls next uh we better get a lot of casting all right Chaney introduce yourself to the audience.

Give us your background. I'm Shani Jo, and I'm the founder of the Keep It Breast Foundation. Our mission is to empower young people around the world with breast health education and support. It's our 18th year. We're based here in Los Angeles, but we're doing work all over the world. We have affiliates in Europe. We're doing work in Mexico. We have some special projects in Africa right now, in Japan, Canada, many places.

So we're really spreading this love for boobs and self-love and early detection all over the world. How did you get into this line of work 18 years ago? Well, it was super accidental. My background is in fashion. I studied fashion design. My background is in fashion. I studied fashion design. I was a denim designer. I worked in the skateboard industry for many years designing jeans for skateboarders, for companies like DC Shoes and Etnies and Altamont. And at the same time, I was producing art exhibitions for a collective called Mode Art. And so we would do these huge

art and fashion exhibitions, usually during the action sports trade Art. And so we would do these huge art and fashion exhibitions, usually during the Action Sports trade show. And from there, one of the artists that we were working with was diagnosed with breast cancer. And we were all in our 20s at the time, you know, in San Diego in skateboard, snowboard scene. And, you know, it was a small community back then. And it really hit a group of people in a way like we didn't understand

that young women could be diagnosed with breast cancer. It was not anything you're thinking about when you're in your 20s, of course. So we all just rallied to get together to do something to raise money to help her. And nothing at that time, everything was really like walks or, you know, pink ribbons or everything seems so old lady. It wasn't really my style, you know. So I was like, well, I know how to do art shows everything seems so old lady. It wasn't really my style, you know. So I was like, well, I know how to do art shows. That's what I'm going to do. I'm going to cast a bunch of boobs, get all my friends together,

get everyone naked, have a big party, like get the plaster out, cast all the boobs, have the artist paint them, do a show. And that's what we did. We raised money and we donated it to her. And it was really ever only just to be a one time thing. And why cast? You talked to me a little bit about this while you were casting me. Why did you decide to do casts on the boobs? Well, I was thinking about creating an exhibition.

And there's always so many shows where artists just donate paintings to raise money. But I wanted to do something really special. And I wanted to create something that told the story of cancer and was able through art and through like the female form, be able to have this discussion that is really difficult to have, you know, especially, I mean, for anyone really at any age. And I've always been a huge fan of Frida Kahlo. And I was always inspired by her. You know know her life was so extraordinary and she was in an accident when she was young and she had to wear these casts and there's all these photos of her in her bed painting her cast and I was just always felt it was such an example of really creating beauty out of tragedy and you know her the strength and the beauty that she represented through so much hardship is to me just so empowering and also the story of many cancer

survivors at the same time so I just decided well I'm gonna instead of asking the artist to just donate a painting I'm gonna make a cast I'm gonna send them boobs so I called all them on the phone like hey you guys I'm gonna send you some boobs in the mail like we paint them and send them back they're like okay Shani whatever and it was yeah it was beautiful it's just a beautiful way to involve not only the castee the person being casted but the artist and it's a story telling the whole way everyone has their own experience and you know you're sharing your experience with your friends and then the artist will share their experience and then you know it just goes along the way and it's it's a conversation tool to talk about you know a serious cause if someone's diagnosed with breast cancer do you go and do the casting before anything happens do you normally do it after how does that work

well we have a special program actually it's called the treasure chest program and it's hard to reach women right at diagnosis because there's so much going on. You're being, you know, shuffled around to so many different appointments. You have to learn an entirely new language. You know, you're getting all these recommendations. And so hopefully through that time, we have a special kit. It's called the Treasure Chest Kit, and it has all the materials you need in it to do the casting in your own home. And we send it to survivors all over the country.

So it can happen, you know, before surgery. A lot of women really like to kind of mark that moment of their natural breast before they're going to either have, you know, reconstruction or a lumpectomy or whatever they're choosing at that point to go through. Or, you know, women will do it after their surgeries. And so it has a different meaning depending on when they decide to do it. Okay, so let's talk about someone that wants to check themselves but doesn't know how to go about it, like me, actually. I think that this is a really good platform for you to come on. There's so many women listening right now.

What's something that everyone can do while they're driving in the shower, in bed, wherever they are right now, at their desk even? Yeah. To check. Yeah. I mean, just right now, everyone can just kind of grab their boobs. We all do it every day, all the time. And it just feels super good, actually. I mean, if you're just kind of squeezing your boobs and massaging them, it's like it's really relaxing and it feels so good. And that's the thing is like we're having a good time. We're like having, you know, happy emotions while we're feeling ourselves. And that's really important.

And so, you know, we have an app. It's called Check Yourself. It shows you how to do the steps of the self-check. And it's important that you do it once a month. And early detection is really the key to survival. So if you find something early, you can, you know, maybe not have to go through so many surgeries or so many things or chemo or radiation or all the things. Do you know what the survival rate is for early detection? The long term survival rate is much higher for early detection.

But depending on the different stages, I don't know like the exact rates. I think they're probably changing all the time. And there's so many different types of breast cancer that like I could never know. I'm not a doctor. So unfortunately, there's a lot of different types of cancer. Is there something near and dear to your heart or something specific that happened that got you interested in breast cancer specifically and being a part of that cause or helping people get through breast cancer or bringing awareness to the space or is it just you know friend or like what was ultimately the the thing that got you so involved in the space yeah personally it was just my one friend who was it was in the year 2000 and she had breast cancer and she, her name was Margaret Kilgallen and she was part of the artist community that, that I was working with.

And so it just, you know, over time, obviously I've met so many young, young, young women who, you know, have to go through, you know, everything that goes along with a breast cancer diagnosis. What goes along with that for someone that doesn't know? What's, what does a breast cancer diagnosis look like? Like walk us from the beginning to sort of the end. Yeah, I mean, for everyone, it could be totally different, right? But when you're checking yourself, you we want you to be checking from a place of love. So you're not looking for cancer. So it's important to just do your check on every month basis to know what's normal for you. And then if you do find something, it could be like you could have, you know, bulging,

you could have itching, you could have rashes, you could actually really feel a hard lump. So there's so many different things that you could be feeling. But if you feel something that isn't normal for you, we wanna encourage you to go to your doctor right away and get that checked out. But then you would get, you know,

a lot of times they'll give you a mamm out. But then you would get, you know, a lot of times they'll give you a mammogram, then maybe you'll get an MRI, and then you'll kind of get shuffled around to different doctors to get your actual diagnosis. And it could look like having, you know, a lumpectomy, which, you know, is not a, you know, it's a major surgery, but you could also look at getting, you know, a single mastectomy or a double mastectomy. For those of us who don't know exactly what that means, can you explain? It's just having your breasts removed. So you could have one or both breasts removed.

You could have radiation. You could have chemotherapy. There's different types of radiation. And then also with chemotherapy, you could do three rounds. You could do six rounds so it's really it's like what your doctor is prescribing and then when you do um you know have a breast removed sometimes they'll put most of the time they'll put something and you'll call it an expander that will kind of stretch out your breast before they can actually do the reconstructed

breast or put in the implant so some women actually um do a reconstructed breast or put in the implant. So some women actually do a reconstructed breast with fat from their stomach. So if they don't want to have an actual artificial implant in their body, you can reconstruct a breast with, you know, take fat from your stomach and put it in your breast. So there's so many different things and so many women have to go through multiple, multiple, multiple surgeries, not only just removing, you know, um, the breast, but there's like nipple sparing. There's so many different things. So I guess as I, as I hear you talking, like this is a lot of scary stuff and a lot of women listening, it's, it's scary for them throughout your years of working in this space and the experience, is there any stories you could think of or people that you can point to that could help maybe empower or give women courage in the space?

What I don't want them to take away from is I don't want people to walk away from this podcast in a space of fear, more of a space of education. Are there any stories that come to mind of anybody that you've worked with that have overcome this or found things early on? I guess, do you know what I'm looking for here? Yeah, absolutely. I think, I mean, first of all, keep abreast. Obviously, if you follow us, if you know who we are, you know that we're coming from a different point of view. So you know we're not your typical breast cancer organization. Our focus is on early detection, it's on breast cancer prevention. It's on all the different things you can do to lower your risk. So we come at this from a youthful, from a fun perspective, and we're not out here to like scare people or freak people out. We're not, you

know, like putting scary statistics in front of your face all day. We're putting like actionable things that you can do to lower your risk. So we want to, you know, empower people. We want to educate people. We want to teach people how to be their own health advocates. What are some things that people can do that are preventative? I'm obsessed with preventative health and beauty. And I just, I find it so interesting that there's things that you can actually do. What are some tips and tricks? There's so many different things. I mean, obviously the first thing is to do your self-check. So knowing your body, knowing what's normal for you. And then there's kind of the typical risk factors like, you know, alcohol, your weight. But a lot of the things that we like to

talk about are living a non-toxic lifestyle. So one of our other programs is called Non-Toxic Revolution. And we teach, you know, small actionable steps that you can do to reduce your toxic exposure that's ultimately going to lower your risk because... What are some of those? Can you give us a couple of examples? Yeah, well, because, well, 90% of cancers are environmental and so there's this only 10% that's related to your family history. So if you think of this 90%, there's things that you can actually control. And so some of the things are, you know, your house. I have to pause you for a second. Can you tell him to take away his hairspray then? Please.

You're spraying that every morning. Go ahead. Well, I don't know if it's toxic or not. I'd have to read the ingredients. It's so toxic, but go on. Just putting that in his head. Go on. But we have these different categories.

So it's your house, your mouth, your body, plastic socks, and heart and soul. So there's different things that you can do in your own home, whether it's cleaning products to lower your risk. These things have harmful carcinogens that you're exposing yourself to on an everyday basis. The different things you're eating, you know, eating organic. We always recommend a plant-based diet is good. So eating organic is important. You know, a high-fiber diet is important. It eating organic is important um you know a high fiber diet is important it definitely lowers your risk um beauty products are a huge one you know really reading your labels

looking for non-toxic beauty products what's like i guess my question i always like to play devil's advocate like when you point to scientific studies like what is there things is the resources or things that you could point to if anybody's interested in looking to those resources absolutely there's um there's a huge massive report called the state of the evidence that was published by um dr janet gray with breast cancer prevention partners years ago and this report is what inspired me actually to start the non-toxic revolution because i was like holy shit this is such gnarly information. No one's going to read this 40-page scientist report. So we kind of take that and break it into actionable steps. We work with organizations like the Environmental Working Group and Breast Cancer Prevention

Partners that are really the leaders in the environmental links to causing cancer. So there is a lot of studies that actually prove that the carcinogens in all of these things that we're exposed to are linked to causing cancer. Okay, but go back to the plastic. I want you to keep going. So yeah, your house, your mouth, your body. So beauty products, lotions, your skin is your largest organ. So just think like how many things are using every day, shaving cream, shampoo, you know, many people are using 13 to 25 products a day and especially in like teen years when your body is more susceptible to these different chemicals you know it's important to teach young women also about the importance of using non-toxic

beauty products so your house your mouth your body plastic sucks so there's all kinds of different chemicals in plastic we don't drink out of plastic. We don't use plastic straws. What are you looking at me? You got like four drinks in front of you. Okay. And a plastic lip thing and your phone case. Yeah. And heart and soul.

You know, like a lot of your prevention is about your stress level and taking care of yourself. So, you know, meditation, listening to good music, going for hikes, getting outside, you know, you have to like finding what it is that can help you de-stress, calm down, you know, is an important factor for prevention. Well, it's clear and proven that stress definitely weakens your immune system, for sure. See there, little devil's advocate, you're on my side. I never try to contradict people, but I always like to try to give both sides of it so that your expertise can shine through. It's super important, you know, and I've been doing this for a long time, but I always like to try to give both sides of it so that your expertise can shine through.

It's super important, you know, and I've been doing this for a long time, but I'm an artist, you know, so I feel really grateful that I'm able to use like my creativity for a good cause and then work with, you know, scientists and doctors to help back all the campaigns and everything that we

do. So we have different campaigns. We have a campaign called open this pit up, which is around your deodorant. We have hair dye campaigns. So what's the best deodorant oh gosh well we really like Schmitz over here at Cuba best that's one of our favorites and there's one called pH fresh that I personally use and there's a lot of really good ones on the market now what about tattoos because you and our you

and our compadres in the tattoo department you think those are it you think we're gonna run into trouble there or actually tattoo ink is pretty toxic so we have a blog on our website and it's one of our top viewed blogs about um tattoo ink and getting um you know making sure you're asking where this ink comes from and yeah i mean it's in our skin so it's too late now no turning back now um i can you call out any brands that you highly recommend? I know you called out some deodorant brands, but is there other brands that you just look at and you say, wow, they really fucking get it? Yeah, I mean, there's a lot of really amazing beauty brands. We have on the Non-Toxic Revolution website, we have a gift shop and we have a lot of really cool brands on there that donate their products to us that people buy straight for a donation.

So it's a way that we can fundraise. There's a brand that I love called Bare Bones Body, which is great for skincare. I use their face oil all the time. I really love the Schmitz deodorant brand. And personally, I don't really wear much makeup. What about house cleaning stuff? Oh, house cleaning stuff. The Honest Company is super good. We love their stuff. And yeah, there's just so many good ones out there now. Okay. And we can find them all on your site if we want to go look and stalk the situation. I would like to know, and maybe this is a weird question, but how has cancer changed and evolved since you started 18 years ago? And I guess my question is, have you seen it affect more younger people? Have you seen breast cancer sort of change?

Or have you seen survival rates change? Or have you seen technology? Or has it stayed the same? You know, science has evolved. And so I think when science evolves, you get more information, you get more knowledge and so you have more of an opportunity to educate and you have more of an opportunity to to inspire and so we want to obviously you know educate people on early detection the things that I've seen changing is more and more young women being diagnosed with breast cancer. So those numbers are definitely going up. Why do you think that is? Globally.

It's the environmental, the environmental exposures. You know, our grandmothers weren't exposed to the things that, that we're exposed to on a daily basis. So we have higher, higher environmental risk to the disease for sure. And I, you know, I really see there's more education, there's more access, there's more groups out there that are, you know, making this available. The conversation is now, you know, mainstream. Also, when our grandmothers or our mothers were diagnosed, you know, they wouldn't tell anyone. People in the family didn't know, you know,

it was a secret. It was a bad thing. You didn't talk about cancer. And so with Keep Abraxas, we really try to break that taboo of breasts and talking about it. And, you know, when something happens like this, it happens to the whole family. What positives have you seen come out of breast cancer? I mean, I'm sure you've seen some really heartwarming, amazing stories. Is there stories that you, um, you know, look to that you're, you're just like obsessed with telling? It's a counterintuitive question, but I get what you're saying. Well, it's, it's counterintuitive, but I'm sure there's gotta be positives that come out of something that's so negative. Yeah. I mean, it makes me want to cry. Actually our, um, our

co-founder, her name is Mona. She was diagnosed with breast cancer. And her mother also had breast cancer. And it was like really, she is the closest person I've ever had to me, you know, who's really gone through this. She's like my best friend, our co-founder. Like I don't know what I would do without her. And, you know, watching her go through this was super hard for me. But something she said that she never felt so loved before. Like through this whole process, it really changed her life in a positive way because she realized how many people really, really, really love her. And I think that was a really big deal for her. And then she also got like crazy into hip hop dancing.

And so she is like a 50 year old like hip hop maniac dancer right now. So beautiful, so sexy. So a lot of times you know like something tragic happens to someone and it can really change their life um their life for the better but also you know people die so i also think that when you're faced with something like that a lot of the stuff that you think's important becomes irrelevant right like you're like maybe that maybe working my ass off of that job doesn't make as much sense maybe killing myself over this you know goal doesn't make sense.

You kind of start doing what you want to do and living. I know that sounds strange, but you really like all the inhibition is out the window. Like, OK, this is what I want to do until you and it puts those what's really important in perspective. Yeah, 100 percent. How can men help a situation? Because you were telling me a little bit about this earlier what can they do I mean there's men also can get breast cancer so it's it's important that men know that they also are at risk but a lot of times also it's the men that will detect the lump in their partner's

breasts so a lot of times we have our education booth and it's out at like surf events or music events and couples are coming up, and the guys are kind of like, oh, this isn't for me, and I'm like, no, wait a minute, here's this educational information, read it, because a lot of times the men are like, hey, babe, that wasn't there before, because they may have their hands on your boobs, you know, more than you do, so it's definitely something just for guys to know that, you know, they have a part in the health of their partner, physical health, mental health, you know, all the things. It's a it's a two way street. And, you know, if for some reason your wife is to be, you know, diagnosed or your girlfriend or anyone in your family, you become a caregiver.

And the caregiver role of men and the family members is a huge role. And caregivers also need a lot of support. It's true, because I don't if I was to close my eyes i was thinking about it it's kind of creepy there's not a lot of textures that i know better in the dark than those than those boobs it's true well they're new boobs so you don't know them that well i mean we're still like you're still courting them don't get too excited we'll do an hour examination we're not married yet with the boobs. Like you're still dating them. We have to do a, we'll do a recovery course. Okay. So if you were to explain how to check yourself, and I know you have an app, you guys will

leave all the info in the show notes. But if you were to explain to someone over audio how to check themselves and break it down like you have on this little list, can you kind of go down it and explain just anyone that's listening that maybe wants to do this right now? Yeah, let's break it down. So the first thing is, is you cannot do this wrong. So there's really no wrong way to do it. But the first step is mirror mirror. So you want to look in the mirror and look at your boobs, put your hands over your head, look at everything. Look on, lift your boob up, lift it over. Just look at your boob everywhere. Does anything, you know, look weird? Is there any puckering? Does anything odd? Just, just have a really good look at yourself. And then the next step after that is called mini massage. And so you just take three fingers and you kind of just go

all around your boob everywhere and you know just give yourself a nice little massage and you're really just looking for anything that doesn't feel normal to you. Step three is up and down. So you're kind of first you're going in a little circular motion so then next you want to go all the way up and down and you want to kind of start at your like chest collarbone and just go all the way down down to your like solar plexus and up and down over across your whole boob so just go up and down up and down up and down up and down up and down up and down and then after that is what we call your pits and so the majority of cancers it's actually 47 percent of cancers are found in this kind of upper quadrant

closer into your armpit area so we tell people just to make sure you know you have your hand over your head and I mean you can do it anywhere wherever you guys all are you know everyone do it and you just get your fingers all up in your pit area and you don't touch your pits very often you know and I even like to use one of those deodorants that you have to actually put on with your fingers and so you want to make sure that you're getting all the way up into your armpit area because that's also where your lymph nodes are, you know, so you want to just check that whole area.

And then the last step is squeeze. So you want to squeeze your nipple, and you're just looking for any, like, irregular pain, any weird discharge, anything that's just not normal. So those are kind of, you know, five steps. But you can make it two, you can make it three. You can just like lay down and relax and use coconut oil or whatever you have. There's all these cute little boobie bombs out there now that you can rub all over your boobs and it just feels really good. And so just rub, massage, squeeze, like however you feel most

comfortable. Just check it out you know I have implants obviously because you just did a cast on me naked um I know you couldn't tell no I'm just kidding really I know riveting no way shocker um what is the difference between someone doing a self-exam with implants and without and is there a difference? It's more difficult to do it you know with implants so you have to you know take a little extra care and knowing what feels normal to you. A lot of women have five or six stick breasts or just you know kind of just naturally lumpy breasts and so it's also a little bit harder or even you know really large breasts it can be more difficult to just

get all around there. So yeah, it's just everyone kind of knowing themselves, knowing what's normal, and also just knowing your family history too is a good thing to know. What advice would you give someone that was diagnosed with breast cancer recently or knows someone or has a family member that was diagnosed? Where can they sort of start? Well, if you're newly diagnosed, there's an awesome organization that we work with called the Young Survival Coalition. And they are like the one stop shop for newly diagnosed women. They kind of just go through everything that you need to know. They tell you everything that you're about to go through and they have all kinds of options and support options.

If you need insurance, if you need support, if you need community, they have different groups all over the country that are there to support you. So we work with the main office in New York, but also with the group in San Diego and Seattle. And they're an amazing organization. We love them. And what about just how to act if you have a family member? Is there something you just think it's just being there for the person or is there something that they maybe can go buy as a gift? Like what would you recommend? I think the best thing is to just be there for that person as a friend and like a lot of times the person

who's going through it doesn't want to talk about their cancer they just want to like normalize their life and with their friends sometimes they just want to bitch so I think one of the biggest things is not giving that person advice because they're getting so much advice all day long and so it's just really empowering them to make decisions unless they're specifically asking you for advice on something. So many people who are diagnosed with breast cancer get crazy advice about like, do this green juice enema or go to my doctor in Mexico or you need to sit and meditate for 10 days straight and your cancer will be cured or don't eat, you know, don't eat sugar, all these

things. And everyone has, you know, it eat sugar all these things and everyone has you know it becomes overwhelming yeah it becomes incredibly overwhelming so really the best thing is just like sit with your friend go for a walk have a coffee chill out just be normal and if you're scared also like tell them that you're scared when my friend best friend was diagnosed I was like I'm afraid like I also need support and she was like like, why do you need support? You don't have cancer. And I was like, I'm like, you're my best friend. Like I'm scared right now'm sure she has a lot of what I definitely she's all let me pull out my scroll like there is I mean and trust me I and the reason I always play devil's advocate is I want to make sure that we're never taking people in direction where they're like oh like they get some really bad advice or saying oh well that person said this so now I can go off and like to me if you're diagnosed with cancer and somebody tells you to go meditate for 10 days, like that is, I mean, common sense that tells you that's very bad advice, in my opinion,

that maybe that offends some people. So I guess what I'm trying to get to is, is there really bad advice that you hear that you would caution people against? I mean, constantly there, there's so much, so much bad advice. And that, but the thing is, is like for someone for someone if if they feel like going to meditate for 10 days is really going to help them like maybe it really will like calm them down yeah that that i can understand like all these things but it may not cure them it's not gonna cure it's not gonna cure them we can definitely say that's not gonna happen but um yeah there is really just

your own gut check and everyone's everyone's gut check is different depending on if they have family or if they're single and what age they are and have they had kids and all these things, you know, so the decisions you're making as a woman are, you know, they affect the people around you, too. So you're making your decisions not only based on what your needs are, but the needs of your family. There's common sense thing that makes sense, right? Like chemicals, obviously bad, certain diet things, bad drinking, too much alcohol, bad. But I also want to make sure that people don't become neurotic about everything, right? We're like, I can't do this. I can't do that. I can't do that. I can't do that. Because then you're creating all sorts of other problems for yourself that may not have anything to do with cancer. Yeah. I mean, you have to live your life. Yeah. Everyone has to just live their life and do their best.

And if you can, you know, reduce your use of single-use plastics, if you can reduce your exposure to pesticides and carcinogens. And if, you know, like I'm not perfect and no one's perfect. You know, a lot of my friends are scared to like do things in front of me because they think I'm like the super judge of all the perfect things. Well, it's not, you know, like I do things everyone normal does. I drink, you know, margaritas all the time. So you just, you have to live your life and you have to like, you know, be joyous and all of those things also lead to like being healthy. What was it like casting Katy Perry oh I actually didn't cast Katy Perry one of my girls Erica casted Katy when she was on the Vance Warped

Tour there's a video on YouTube so you can watch it who was your favorite person to cast oh my gosh I have casted I have casted so many women all over the world. I really love casting Dita Von Teese. She was a really fun one, really sweet, beautiful, beautiful boobs, beautiful girl. She did the art on her own cast, and it was like you would love it. It was super pink, glittery, like iridescent glitter everywhere with these golden like swirly tassels on it. You got Lauren pinned to a T. Oh, gosh.

Her cast was really beautiful. And, yeah, I have so many good memories of casting survivors at all different stages of, you know, their bodies. And, yes. You cast Pink. Casted Pink. That was a really fun one. Gigi Gorgeous. Casted Gigi just like. For Crush Cosmetics. A couple weeks ago, it was really fun one. Gigi Gorgeous. Casted Gigi just like...

For Crush Cosmetics. A couple weeks ago, it was super fun to cast Gigi. She is like really free and she loves her boobs. And we have her fiance painted the cast and it's really, really beautiful. Don't get any ideas, Michael. You're not going to paint my cast. Sorry. I have a more of a freehand style. Yeah, no, no, no, we won't do that. I was going to ask you what a book or which book or resource you recommend,

but I think I actually want to recommend it for you, which is your app. I mean, I think you should talk about your app here and what a resource that is for breast cancer awareness. Yeah, we have this app. It's an incredible tool. It's called Check Yourself. It's free. It's in both the Google, Android, and Apple stores. I just downloaded it. It's so feminine and pink and cheeky and cute. Thank you. Yeah, it's really our goal to make it beautiful and to make it like fun to open. And so it has a special feature where you can set a time and a day to send you an automatic reminder so it's best to do your self-check a week after your period so if you kind of have a good idea you can ask your assistant lauren when your period is i asked my assistant i text mimi today

from the kitchen i go wait when was my last period because she keeps track of it that's kind of bleak are y'all laughing she can set it for you maybe are you listening right now maybe he's a busy body she needs to get a hug do you know when my last period was when we the last most when we the most grumpy so you want to set it and um set it and forget it so it'll send you a text message once a month that says time to check yourself and so the app goes through the steps it also has more information, more resources. It's available in six languages. We have women in over 170 countries using the app.

We have about 61,000 users. We're trying to get to 80,000 by the end of this year. So I need all of you out there to download it. Help me reach my goals. And we'll be adding new languages every year. And you know, it's a it's it's amazing tool because so many women don't have access to this information, especially in countries where, you know, you really don't talk about boobs. And so we see people in random places, you know, in Turkey and Pakistan and, you know, crazy parts of China and

all over the world, we can see the map of where they're downloading this. I'm just like, how do they even know this exists, what they do? And so we have this opportunity to empower women with information on their own home that they can do, you know, anywhere on their phone. Everyone has a phone now and in their own language. It's efficient, too, just how I like it. Yes. Where can everyone find Keepabreast?

Tell us. Give us the deets. Keepabreast.org, on Instagram, web, everywhere. We're just Keepabreast everywhere. We're easy to find. We're all over the place. Lauren likes to end every show with a quote from her favorite person, Ulysses S. Grant, the leader of the North.

Lauren, go ahead. He still can't get over this michael i'm in a cast tonight the story and gave a quote by the story of ulysses which you can't get over the ancient story and lauren thought it was ulysses s grant the leader of the north and i'm never letting it go sorry we can't all be perfect i like it thank you for coming so much for coming on that was so informative oh thank you guys and you know let me know how the breast checks go over there if someone wants to check out my uh my cast with the art we're gonna get on it do you know when that info is gonna be up and where they can find it we'll have to figure it out you'll post

about it yeah i'll post it on my insta guys all right y'all thank you for coming thank you check yourself hey guys we have an ask here if you're enjoying our podcast and you're an avid listener, please head over to the Skinny Confidential Him and Her podcast on iTunes and rate and review the podcast. If you do this, screenshot it and send it to asklauren at the skinnyconfidential.com. That's Lauren with a Y. And we will send you my five favorite beauty hacks straight to your inbox. We would really, really appreciate your support. Also be sure to look out for a Thursday episode this week. It's going to be a good one.

And with that, we'll see you in a couple of days.