This Makes Three.
I was just sitting down to write a bubbly entry about being in Vegas right now but I received sobering news from InuGrrrl tonight via DA note since this is the first time in three days that I've had internet access to check my messages/mail.
For those of you who didn't know, Jessie Angel (thevoodoobanshee), the client who commissioned me for the images of the fallen angel Daniel, had been fighting cancer for quite some time. I was just informed tonight that she passed away on July 10th.
Although Jessie started out as a client for me, she quickly turned into a friend. Her death by itself is painful, but the reason for it is enraging to me. If her doctors had only LISTENED to her when she first felt there was something wrong, she would possibly still be here. She felt a mass, she wanted it biopsied, and her idiot doctor refused to do it because she was "too young" to have cancer. I believe it was cervical but I could be remembering it wrong. It started BLEEDING and he still wouldn't look into it. He finally did when she raised hell about it, at which point it was diagnosed as advanced cancer and she had to have a complete hysterectomy even though she and her husband wanted to have more children. If her idiot doctor would have just listened to her concerns, it would have been caught early enough that she might have been saved.
She was 29 years old.
My illustration prof at Ringling told me he had never had a client die during his nearly 40 years in the business. I have now been in business for less than 10 years and I have had three clients die, two of them from cancer. All of these experiences along with Angeline's battle has made me a drill sergeant about getting cancer screenings done on a regular basis not only for myself but for the rest of my family as well. So I cannot stress it to all of you enough: GET YOUR CANCER SCREENINGS DONE. Mammograms, pap smears, prostate exams, dermatologist checks, colonoscopies... if you are at the right age for it, GET IT DONE. PLEASE. If you smoke, STOP IT. And more than that, if you think something is wrong with you and your doctor refuses to listen to you, GO TO ANOTHER DOCTOR. It isn't worth risking your life just because your doctor has their head so far up their own butt that they won't listen to anyone but themselves. You don't have to be a rocket scientist to know when something isn't right with your own body. GET A SECOND OPINION.
Jessie told me a few weeks ago that she was strongly considering transferring all the copyrights to Daniel and Elizabeth over to me. I don't know if she ever put anything in place for that to happen, but I am honored all the same that she was willing to trust me with something so significant. I want to make just one more image of Daniel (since I don't know if I have the right to produce images of him) as a memorial to her.
I'll write up my traveling entry as a separate thing. This needs to stand by itself.
Rest in Peace, Jessie. ♥
For those of you who didn't know, Jessie Angel (thevoodoobanshee), the client who commissioned me for the images of the fallen angel Daniel, had been fighting cancer for quite some time. I was just informed tonight that she passed away on July 10th.
Although Jessie started out as a client for me, she quickly turned into a friend. Her death by itself is painful, but the reason for it is enraging to me. If her doctors had only LISTENED to her when she first felt there was something wrong, she would possibly still be here. She felt a mass, she wanted it biopsied, and her idiot doctor refused to do it because she was "too young" to have cancer. I believe it was cervical but I could be remembering it wrong. It started BLEEDING and he still wouldn't look into it. He finally did when she raised hell about it, at which point it was diagnosed as advanced cancer and she had to have a complete hysterectomy even though she and her husband wanted to have more children. If her idiot doctor would have just listened to her concerns, it would have been caught early enough that she might have been saved.
She was 29 years old.
My illustration prof at Ringling told me he had never had a client die during his nearly 40 years in the business. I have now been in business for less than 10 years and I have had three clients die, two of them from cancer. All of these experiences along with Angeline's battle has made me a drill sergeant about getting cancer screenings done on a regular basis not only for myself but for the rest of my family as well. So I cannot stress it to all of you enough: GET YOUR CANCER SCREENINGS DONE. Mammograms, pap smears, prostate exams, dermatologist checks, colonoscopies... if you are at the right age for it, GET IT DONE. PLEASE. If you smoke, STOP IT. And more than that, if you think something is wrong with you and your doctor refuses to listen to you, GO TO ANOTHER DOCTOR. It isn't worth risking your life just because your doctor has their head so far up their own butt that they won't listen to anyone but themselves. You don't have to be a rocket scientist to know when something isn't right with your own body. GET A SECOND OPINION.
Jessie told me a few weeks ago that she was strongly considering transferring all the copyrights to Daniel and Elizabeth over to me. I don't know if she ever put anything in place for that to happen, but I am honored all the same that she was willing to trust me with something so significant. I want to make just one more image of Daniel (since I don't know if I have the right to produce images of him) as a memorial to her.
I'll write up my traveling entry as a separate thing. This needs to stand by itself.
Rest in Peace, Jessie. ♥