As a member of the Diversity and Inclusion Leadership Board at my high school, I had the opportunity to attend the Ignatian Family Teach-in for Justice in November. There I met Dewayne Brown, a black man who spent 9 years on Death Row for a murder he did not commit.
I was barely one-year-old when I was diagnosed with cancer and it was, unmistakably, the worst thing to ever happen to me. The diagnosis was a long process, followed by a long treatment, and through every stage, it was all happening to me, I had no control. Cancer wasn’t the only struggle I faced during this journey.
In an age of deep strife and conflict, women must rise, must come together, with the strength and unity history has worked so hard to strip us of. We are the stuff of legends, of queens, of goddesses. In the right shirt, I can run any room. With the right support, I have no doubt that any woman - no matter her age, her color, or her identity – can create the change she needs in the world. Just as I am trying my best to do.