Almost two years after announcing a double mastectomy to prevent cancer from gaining a foothold, Angelina Jolie has announced in a 3.24 N.Y. Times op-ed piece that she’s undergone a second preventive surgery, the removal of her ovaries and fallopian tubes. In a manner of speaking we all have the Sword of Damocles above our heads, but Jolie’s attitude about her situation strikes me as exceptionally brave and open-hearted. “It is not possible to remove all risk, and the fact is I remain prone to cancer,” she writes. “I will look for natural ways to strengthen my immune system. I feel feminine, and grounded in the choices I am making for myself and my family. I know my children will never have to say, ‘Mom died of ovarian cancer.'”
