Watson’s attitude toward reconstruction, and to the women who wanted it, speaks not only to a serious dearth of compassion (“easily disposable utilitarian appendage”!!!) but a one-track mindset bent on aggressively eradicating disease, no matter the cost. Doctors were there to keep women from dying, not to ensure their quality of life thereafter—indeed, the reluctance to reconstruct a breast post-mastectomy stemmed in part from a fear among physicians that doing so would cause them to miss the recurrence of more cancer—and so their patients were simply expected to make peace with their
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