In my own practice, I see women diagnosed with metastatic breast cancer who have been scolded that the most important thing they can do is maintain a positive outlook—as if survival is not a matter of medicine but proper mental hygiene. This toxic idea is pervasive across culture and class alike; I have seen women from religious communities told that they should pray their cancer away, while women from elite wellness circles try to manifest and visualize themselves into remission. It is enraging, and it is also history made manifest: when sickness spreads, even through her own body, a woman
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