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With breast cancer, it's all about detection. You have to educate young women and encourage them to do everything they have to do.

There are a lot of people who don't know what metastatic breast cancer is.

My mom was diagnosed with breast cancer when I was 13 and it was something we weren't really aware of as a family.

I didn't know anything about breast cancer when I got it.

At my age, I don't think anyone is untouched by cancer.

Whether you're a mother or father, or a husband or a son, or a niece or a nephew or uncle, breast cancer doesn't discriminate.

I had been afraid of breast cancer, as I suspect most women are, from the time I hit adolescence. At that age, when our emerging sexuality is our central preoccupation, the idea of disfigurement of a breast is particularly horrifying.

That's why I talk about the breast cancer: because I want women - and everyone - to stay on top of things and get checked. I know how scary it can be. When I dealt with it, I was like, 'Oh my God.' And I have so many other friends who have gone through it or have suffered a loss.

I feel that between my experience and my mother's, breast cancer is a little bit like someone who lives next door. I know what that person looks like and what their daily habits are.

I started realizing I could be an example for women to not just be aware of breast cancer but to act on it, to make an appointment, to give themselves an exam.