Who isn’t impressed by Angelina Jolie these days? After her New York Times opinion piece went viral on Tuesday morning, the world now knows that the mom of six made the brave decision to go ahead with a preventative double mastectomy after learning that she carried a BRCA gene mutation that gave her an 87% chance of developing breast cancer. Her bravery and honesty will undoubtedly help women all over the world, and here at Elizabeth Street we’ve been incredibly touched by the words she and her family have to say about one another.
In her article, Jolie wrote that it was “reassuring” to her to see that her children were not uncomfortable with the changes their mother went through. “They can see my small scars and that’s it. Everything else is just Mommy, the same as she always was. And they know that I love them and will do anything to be with them as long as I can.”
Indeed, her family has been incredibly helpful. Angelina expressed how fortunate she felt to have a “loving and supportive” partner, and that she and Brad Pitt “knew this was the right thing to do for our family and that it would bring us closer. And it has.”
In turn, Brad Pitt called his wife-to-be heroic in a statement, and his mother piped up to tell the world that she is “so very proud of Angie. This means so much to our family, especially our grandchildren. We love her dearly.” Her brother James Haven compared her to their own mother, who “always put her children first.”
Her doctor took to the Pink Lotus Center’s blog to praise Angie for not letting surgery slow her day: “On day four after her mastectomies, I was pleased to find her not only in good spirits with bountiful energy, but with two walls in her house covered with freshly assembled storyboards for the next project she is directing. All the while she spoke, six drains dangled from her chest, three on each side, fastened to an elastic belt around her waist.”
“All I want is for her to have a long and healthy life, with myself and our children,” Pitt finished in his statement after her piece was published. “This is a happy day for our family.”