January, 18th 2025: Join us for food, drinks, dancing, and author sharing — all to support our mission. Learn more here!
Survivorship
The stories and experiences are written by people after cancer treatments. These stories are written for those learning how to get back to work, college or just trying to be themselves again. Just getting past treatments isn’t enough, it is surviving and thriving that is key to being you again.
Want to submit a story? Click Here.
Moles and Monsters
I had to have a mole removed recently. Not so much a mole mole as a splotch, a flat, discolored smudge about the size of a nickel, borderless and nearly inconspicuous among the follicles.
Read More...Cancer and Domestic Abuse: My Story
I thought I knew who I was, what my purpose was, what love was, and what trust was. Turns out, sadly, I had no idea all along.
Read More...My Identity After Cancer
After being diagnosed with cancer and overcoming it, a new label was added to my identity: cancer survivor. While this label carries a positive connotation, it also brings a sense of uncertainty.
Read More...I May Not Know Who I Am, But I Know What I Want
In popular lore, there is the cliche that before you die, your life flashes before your eyes. When I was 24, I was told I had stage III cancer, and what flashed before my eyes was all the life I should have lived: the wedding I would never have, the kids I would never raise, the dreams I was working toward—everything I thought I had time for could vanish in an instant.
Read More...Cancer is Not My Identity
Life after cancer isn’t what I, or many, expect it to be like. Like a lot of others, it’s believed that once your treatment is over and you are disease-free, your life will go back to how it once was.
Read More...I Wish Someone Told Me to Try to Go with the Flow
When I was diagnosed the first time around, back in 2017, I had a pretty idealistic view of how I would navigate chemotherapy. I was convinced I would successfully use the cold cap and keep all of my hair.
Read More...if someone told me…
I wish someone told me that survivorship would be the hardest part…
that it’s like a rollercoaster,
except the track changes every time you start the ride again.
Life Goes On?
I looked in the mirror as I furiously brushed my hair. It reached down maybe a third down my back. It’s taken 12 years to get this long. I’ve only ever trimmed and shaped it a few times; I worry about cutting a chunk off, in case it won’t grow back.
Read More...Skin
You took the skin off my back, literally.
You left me numb, emotionally and physically.
Young Breast Cancer Your Story and Mine: A Compact Guide
Due to the problem of omission of public breast health education, I believed that “it couldn’t be cancer.” I didn’t know my risk factors, and I believed I was too young. This belief fueled my own delay in seeking care for some months, which could have been detrimental to my survival due to the extra aggressive nature of my tumor being Triple Negative breast cancer.
Read More...