Catherine Gigante-Brown

I left Cuba in 1949, when I was 11 years old. Back then, I didn't understand why my mother sent me away. I still don't.

Although America’s “lying in period” fell by the wayside in the 19th century with the disappearance of the frontier, it’s alive and well today in many cultures globally. Seclusion traditions where both mother and child recover and bond are still the norm in many cultures worldwide.

The overinflated American work ethic is slowly killing us. It’s constantly pushing us to do more — put in longer hours, check business emails on personal time, take calls from our bosses when we’re chilling in Cancun.

A new U.S. Preventive Services Task Force recommendation on mammograms ensures more women will die of breast cancer.

Were you going to run into that cute guy John Williams on the way home? Would you see Anne Marie by the lockers and sort out what to do for the weekend? It was hit-or-miss, and that was the beauty of it. The breath-holding chance of it all. Now, our kids’ friends are as close as a keyboard stroke away. It’s too easy.

I saw my present mother-in-law in a whole new light the first time she held my newborn son.

Having someone steal my cancer history and co-opt it for their first-person Facebook blog is unbelievably violating. Somehow, it feels almost as invasive as my mastectomy.

If the odds of getting cancer are like Powerball, why couldn't I be a scratch-off millionaire?

TCM (traditional Chinese medicine) has been around for at least five centuries –– there’s got to be something to it.

Alas, I am the lone female in a house full of men. Only two men, but they take up a lot of space.