January, 18th 2025: Join us for food, drinks, dancing, and author sharing — all to support our mission. Learn more here!
Cancer
Surveillance is Not Enough
I wouldn’t be able to tell you the last time I cried, but I remember doing so on June 12, 2013. Tears of relief, awe, and slight trepidation. After six months of chemotherapy and five years of six-month surveillance check-ins, I left my treating oncologist’s office for the last time.
Read More...Love and a Higher Power
Content/Trigger Warning: Sexual Harassment. Does a higher power exist? I believe so and always have. Although, throughout my life, I have had a hard time connecting with it.
Read More...A Second Chance
Never in my life did I think I would be here today writing about being a two-time cancer survivor at 28 years old. My name is Gena Bradshaw, and I was diagnosed with leukemia at age three and a half and thyroid cancer at age twenty.
Read More...Night Vision
Some years are a dark tunnel / claustrophobic with exhaust / Some, an open field / the biggest sky and the slightest breeze / And I suspect some years / fall somewhere in between / But my memory lately / is of the extremes
Read More...The Who’s Who of Sexual Health in Survivorship
Building a Sexual Wellness Recovery Team. Changes in sex, intimacy, and relationships are common after cancer. But if you are experiencing an issue, it can feel pretty lonely, and you may not know who to ask for help. Your primary care or oncology care teams are always a good place to start.
Read More...Stop Calling Me a Warrior
I remember the day I was diagnosed with cancer, but it is all a bit of a blur. You know how sometimes videos are made of snap shots of split-second moments—they just flash up on the screen. Maybe a picture for each minute.
Read More...The “G” Word
If I said, “The ‘C’ word”, you would know exactly what I’m referring to. Cancer has earned many names and initials over the years. Yet there’s one word that we still can’t seem to find ways to discuss, we struggle to accept it, and we simply fear it.
Read More...A Horrible Nightmare
May 24th started like any other regular Sunday morning. I had just returned from a trip and was catching up with my dad, stepmom, and younger sister, telling stories while drinking a cup of coffee. Our light and giggly conversations about the weather and our dinner plans for that night quickly took a turn as I heard the words, “There is something we have to tell you.”
Read More...Supported and Surrounded
I sat on the crisp white sheets of my friend’s bed, scrolling through my phone. Suddenly, my face felt wet and my hand pulled away from my nose, covered in blood. I sprung from the bed so as not to sully the new sheets, dashed to the sink and stuffed paper towel after paper towel in my nose.
Read More...Let Your Grief Help You Find the Light
“People talk about grief as emptiness, but it’s not empty. It’s full. Heavy. Not an absence to fill. A weight to pull. Your skin caught on hooks chained to rough boulders made of all the futures you thought you’d have.”
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