What to Expect:

Why is it that we think we’re invincible until we get a cancer diagnosis and then realize we are finite? We come face to face with our mortality and it’s an ugly meeting for sure. How can this happen to me? I eat healthy, work out, don’t smoke, go to bed early, blah blah blah. The answer is that cancer is the perfect storm: just the right mixture of genetics, environment, food, and lifestyle. At least that is what I believe after three Big C health events.

Once you realize you’re truly mortal and there is a possibility you might die from this disease, everything shifts. After three diagnoses (each one a surprise), I knew that there were some huge dynamic shifts that needed to happen in my life and it was time to face them: How I perceived our culture’s definition of “pretty” and what that has meant to me as a young girl and a woman. What I was willing to do to become that perfect vision of loveliness with no regard to my health along the way and finally, who I am NOW after cancer bout #3. I will admit I didn’t give much thought to the inner work I needed to do until very recently. Even though I’ve counseled kids and adults for several decades, my own inner work wasn’t important to me. I’ve always been recalcitrant to tackle my own demons until I lived through the hardest year of my life (2024) just fighting literally to survive.

This blog will talk about the wisdom I have gained from cancer…hard won but grateful to have it.