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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.
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Tides
We got out of our 2008 Toyota Matrix, arriving at a gorgeous cabin on the coast of Maine, so far from our little apartment in South Brooklyn, on a little peninsula looking out over a chain of islands leading out to the Atlantic.
Read More...Finding My Herd Through Writing
“Finding your herd.” At a first glance, what does this mean? My first thought was that I should look for a group of animals. Then I realized that I should be looking at people instead.
Read More...To the Boobies
I’m not sure if I’ve given you enough appreciation for the numbered years we had, because you weren’t really my asset; you were not big. I would look at other girls and sometimes I’d wish you’d be like theirs, but really most of the time having you felt like I didn’t give a damn, because I know that you are not the only one that made me feel beautiful, and my femininity does not solely belong to you.
Read More...How Do I Break the News?
How Do I Break The News? Cancer, Companionship, and Right to Privacy. Navigating the dating scene is particularly difficult for everyone, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic. However, it gets even worse when one is a cancer survivor.
Read More...Helping Others Actually Helps Yourself
Most people don’t think about the full power of volunteering. It is easy to see how the giving of your time helps the receiver, but you can’t fully understand the gift to yourself. It can take lots of time to fully reveal itself.
Read More...Cancer Follows Me Everywhere
I’m heading home after my first date in Boston. Normally my dating app M.O. has ten steps that include texting, phone calls, and other precautions before an in-person meeting. But something was different with this guy.
Read More...“Silenzio, Bruno!”
My mom died from pancreatic cancer three months into the COVID-19 pandemic, a short three and a half years after my dad died from AML. My husband, two daughters, and I slipped into isolation and grief through all the COVID headlines, trying to keep our heads above water through a funeral, cleaning out her house, and figuring out where the line was on being safe and keeping sane.
Read More...We’re All a Little Lost
It’s the holiday season, and Santa Claus is coming ‘round… so begin the lyrics to a very cheerful Christmas song, about Santa helping us celebrate the holidays. But sitting here, in a borrowed house because my family is quarantined due to breakthrough COVID and I can’t be with them, with sunlight streaming through the window onto the artificial hyacinth, I’m feeling anything but cheer.
Read More...New Year, New Me…
New year, new me… I have always absolutely hated that saying. However, this year I literally am a “new me.” Most of my cells have been killed and replaced to generate a “new me.” Living most of six months in the hospital for intensive chemotherapy has formed a “new me.”
Read More...Surviving Cancer: My Life’s Retrospective
Four years have passed since my initial cancer diagnosis, and reflecting back on that Halloween evening of 2017 does not get any easier. I still remember the clothes I was wearing and the pink eyeshadow that made me feel like a million bucks as I walked into the endocrinology department at the local hospital.
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