Cancer Survivor Quotes

I don't mind getting older; it's a privilege denied to so many!

I once spoke to someone who had survived the genocide in Rwanda, and she said to me that there was now nobody left on the face of the earth, either friend or relative, who knew who she was. No one who remembered her girlhood and her early mischief and family lore; no sibling or boon companion who could tease her about that first romance; no lover or pal with whom to reminisce. All her birthdays, exam results, illnesses, friendships, kinships—gone. She went on living, but with a tabula rasa as her diary and calendar and notebook. I think of this every time I hear of the callow ambition to 'make a new start' or to be 'born again': Do those who talk this way truly wish for the slate to be wiped? Genocide means not just mass killing, to the level of extermination, but mass obliteration to the verge of extinction. You wish to have one more reflection on what it is to have been made the object of a 'clean' sweep? Try Vladimir Nabokov's microcosmic miniature story 'Signs and Symbols,' which is about angst and misery in general but also succeeds in placing it in what might be termed a starkly individual perspective. The album of the distraught family contains a faded study of Aunt Rosa, a fussy, angular, wild-eyed old lady, who had lived in a tremulous world of bad news, bankruptcies, train accidents, cancerous growths—until the Germans put her to death, together with all the people she had worried about.

Me: Well, you see, I, uh, I'm a cancer survivor. Person #1: And how's that working out for you? Me: Well, you see, I, uh, used to have leukemia. Person #2: Dude, how come you're not, like, BALD? Me: Well, you see, I, uh, I had acute lymphocytic lymphoma when I was five. Person #3: Whoa. THAT must'a sucked. I once had my tonsils out...

Awful things happen to an awful lot of us & it's a happy moment when you start noticing some kind of payoff. Cancer survivors for ex, notice that they're breathing in a way other people don't. And because they are breathing they are grateful in a way a lot of people aren't. And grateful is a good place to wind up in life. It beats poor me.

We normally know we're getting older, when the only thing we want for our birthday, is not to be reminded; unless you're a cancer survivor, then we love being reminded! - Chris Geiger

On the back part of the step, toward the right, I saw a small iridescent sphere of almost unbearable brilliance. At first I thought it was revolving; then I realised that this movement was an illusion created by the dizzying world it bounded. The Aleph's diameter was probably little more than an inch, but all space was there, actual and undiminished. Each thing (a mirror's face, let us say) was infinite things, since I distinctly saw it from every angle of the universe. I saw the teeming sea; I saw daybreak and nightfall; I saw the multitudes of America; I saw a silvery cobweb in the center of a black pyramid; I saw a splintered labyrinth (it was London); I saw, close up, unending eyes watching themselves in me as in a mirror; I saw all the mirrors on earth and none of them reflected me; I saw in a backyard of Soler Street the same tiles that thirty years before I'd seen in the entrance of a house in Fray Bentos; I saw bunches of grapes, snow, tobacco, lodes of metal, steam; I saw convex equatorial deserts and each one of their grains of sand; I saw a woman in Inverness whom I shall never forget; I saw her tangled hair, her tall figure, I saw the cancer in her breast; I saw a ring of baked mud in a sidewalk, where before there had been a tree; I saw a summer house in Adrogué and a copy of the first English translation of Pliny -- Philemon Holland's -- and all at the same time saw each letter on each page (as a boy, I used to marvel that the letters in a closed book did not get scrambled and lost overnight); I saw a sunset in Querétaro that seemed to reflect the colour of a rose in Bengal; I saw my empty bedroom; I saw in a closet in Alkmaar a terrestrial globe between two mirrors that multiplied it endlessly; I saw horses with flowing manes on a shore of the Caspian Sea at dawn; I saw the delicate bone structure of a hand; I saw the survivors of a battle sending out picture postcards; I saw in a showcase in Mirzapur a pack of Spanish playing cards; I saw the slanting shadows of ferns on a greenhouse floor; I saw tigers, pistons, bison, tides, and armies; I saw all the ants on the planet; I saw a Persian astrolabe; I saw in the drawer of a writing table (and the handwriting made me tremble) unbelievable, obscene, detailed letters, which Beatriz had written to Carlos Argentino; I saw a monument I worshipped in the Chacarita cemetery; I saw the rotted dust and bones that had once deliciously been Beatriz Viterbo; I saw the circulation of my own dark blood; I saw the coupling of love and the modification of death; I saw the Aleph from every point and angle, and in the Aleph I saw the earth and in the earth the Aleph and in the Aleph the earth; I saw my own face and my own bowels; I saw your face; and I felt dizzy and wept, for my eyes had seen that secret and conjectured object whose name is common to all men but which no man has looked upon -- the unimaginable universe. I felt infinite wonder, infinite pity.

We are left wondering why we are having good days, why we are surviving. It is curious that survivor's guilt could befall a cancer patient.

Be careful of using the word normal around cancer patients, whether they call themselves a survivor or not, there is no 'back to normal'.

like most cancer survivors, lived with uncertainty.

We normally know we're getting older when the only thing we want for our birthday is not to be reminded; unless you're a cancer survivor! Then we love people reminding us!

I'm never going to give in. I'm never going to give up, and I will fight back with every breath I have." - Dionne Warner, seven-time cancer survivor and subject of Never Leave Your Wingman

Do not be blind in love and try not to suffer in silence. -Alba Castillo

Heaven is freakin' not ready for me!" - seven-time cancer survivor Dionne Warner in Never Leave Your Wingman

Observations often tell you more about the observer than the observed.

We cannot outrun our past trauma. We can’t bury it and think that we will be fine. We cannot skip the essential stage of processing, accepting, and doing the hard, yet necessary trauma recovery work. There’s a body-mind connection. Trauma can manifest itself into chronic physical pain, cancer, inflammation, auto-immune conditions, depression, anxiety, PTSD, Complex PTSD, addictions, and ongoing medical conditions.

Dear Mr. Peter Van Houten (c/o Lidewij Vliegenthart), My name is Hazel Grace Lancaster. My friend Augustus Waters, who read An Imperial Affliction at my recommendationtion, just received an email from you at this address. I hope you will not mind that Augustus shared that email with me. Mr. Van Houten, I understand from your email to Augustus that you are not planning to publish any more books. In a way, I am disappointed, but I'm also relieved: I never have to worry whether your next book will live up to the magnificent perfection of the original. As a three-year survivor of Stage IV cancer, I can tell you that you got everything right in An Imperial Affliction. Or at least you got me right. Your book has a way of telling me what I'm feeling before I even feel it, and I've reread it dozens of times. I wonder, though, if you would mind answering a couple questions I have about what happens after the end of the novel. I understand the book ends because Anna dies or becomes too ill to continue writing it, but I would really like to mom-wether she married the Dutch Tulip Man, whether she ever has another child, and whether she stays at 917 W. Temple etc. Also, is the Dutch Tulip Man a fraud or does he really love them? What happens to Anna's friends-particularly Claire and Jake? Do they stay that this is the kind of deep and thoughtful question you always hoped your readers would ask-what becomes of Sisyphus the Hamster? These questions have haunted me for years-and I don't know long I have left to get answers to them. I know these are not important literary questions and that your book is full of important literally questions, but I would just really like to know. And of course, if you ever do decide to write anything else, even if you don't want to publish it. I'd love to read it. Frankly, I'd read your grocery lists. Yours with great admiration, Hazel Grace Lancaster (age 16)

With organization comes empowerment.

It's one thing knowing you people cheering you on, yet another to know they have walked in your footsteps.

All journeys eventually end in the same place, home. - Chris Geiger

Приймати допомогу, що йде від любові, - це було одне з найправильніших рішень за час лікування.

The world is such a big place; staying in one town your whole life, is like never leaving your house.

Read a good book every day. Books help to educate the soul. The mere joy of learning something new will instill the will to live in you.

When we finally let go... that's when the real fun begins." The Second Most Exotic Marigold Hotel

You're actually each other's wingman. You never leave your partner vulnerable." - Graham Warner, husband of fun-loving seven-time cancer survivor Dionne Warner

Cancer Survivor

How many paths had I avoided in life? How many times had I been content to stop at "close enough"--too afraid to push ahead? Too afraid to let go? Too afraid to give up . . . control.

I've learned so much during my time with cancer. It's taught me a lot about who I am. It revealed to me my true goals and priorities. It introduced me to a brand new world where time isn't wasted, and important things aren't left unsaid. All the while, the superfluities of life are ignored and forgotten. Because I now understand how a person should act, whether confronted by death or not. And it's a shame that's what it takes to scare someone into becoming a conducive, meritable human being.

Our health—and indeed our entire lives—can be seen as the sum of all our moment-to-moment decisions. This includes how we choose to eat and drink, think and feel, act and react, and move and rest on any given day.

You don’t need to fit into any square, round or triangular holes anymore. You don’t need to fit into a pretty package or be the same as everybody else. You just need to accept and love yourself exactly as you are.

Even if you are sick or unhappy today, look for the beautiful things life has to offer: the fact that you are living, breathing and capable of loving others is reason enough to celebrate. Life is beautiful anyway.

Like she, Debra McCurdy, was put on this earth to be a cancer survivor and live to tell the tale to any and everyone… at least five to ten times. Mom reminisces about cancer the way most people reminisce about vacations.

Myriad Genetics, which holds the patents on the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes responsible for most cases of hereditary breast and ovarian cancer, charges $3,000 to test for the genes. Myriad has been accused of creating a monopoly, since no one else can offer the test, and researchers can’t develop cheaper tests or new therapies without getting permission from Myriad and paying steep licensing fees. Scientists who’ve gone ahead with research involving the breast-cancer genes without Myriad’s permission have found themselves on the receiving end of cease-and-desist letters and threats of litigation. In May 2009 the American Civil Liberties Union, several breast-cancer survivors, and professional groups representing more than 150,000 scientists sued Myriad Genetics over its breast-cancer gene patents. Among other things, scientists involved in the case claim that the practice of gene patenting has inhibited their research, and they aim to stop it. The presence of so many scientists in the suit, many of them from top institutions, challenges the standard argument that ruling against biological patents would interfere with scientific progress

When you are angry, your blood pressure rises, you forget the basic norms of good behavior, you start shouting, you even use foul language and dig out all the past corpses of incidents afresh to ruin your future. So, choose to remain peaceful and stable --- whatever the situation.

not sure anybody ever gets completely over their first love, and that still rankles. Part of me still wants to know what was wrong with me. What I was lacking. I’m in my sixties now, my hair is gray and I’m a prostate cancer survivor, but I still want to know why I wasn’t good enough for Wendy Keegan.

In the writings of many contemporary psychics and mystics (e.g., Gopi Krishna, Shri Rajneesh, Frannie Steiger, John White, Hal Lindsay, and several dozen others whose names I have mercifully forgotten) there is a repeated prediction that the Earth is about to be afflicted with unprecedented calamities, including every possible type of natural catastrophe from Earthquakes to pole shifts. Most of humanity will be destroyed, these seers inform us cheerfully. This cataclysm is referred to, by many of them, as "the Great Purification" or "the Great Cleansing," and is supposed to be a punishment for our sins. I find the morality and theology of this Doomsday Brigade highly questionable. A large part of the Native American population was exterminated in the 19th century; I cannot regard that as a "Great Cleansing" or believe that the Indians were being punished for their sins. Nor can I think of Hitler's death camps, or Hiroshima or Nagasaki, as "Great Purifications." And I can't make myself believe that the millions killed by plagues, cancers, natural catastrophes, etc., throughout history were all singled out by some Cosmic Intelligence for punishment, while the survivors were preserved due to their virtues. To accept the idea of "God" implicit in such views is logically to hold that everybody hit by a car deserved it, and we should not try to get him to a hospital and save his life, since "God" wants him dead. I don't know who are the worst sinners on this planet, but I am quite sure that if a Higher Intelligence wanted to exterminate them, It would find a very precise method of locating each one separately. After all, even Lee Harvey Oswald -- assuming the official version of the Kennedy assassination -- only hit one innocent bystander while aiming at JFK. To assume that Divinity would employ earthquakes and pole shifts to "get" (say) Richard Nixon, carelessly murdering millions of innocent children and harmless old ladies and dogs and cats in the process, is absolutely and ineluctably to state that your idea of God is of a cosmic imbecile.

Fuck anyone who judges how survivors deal with their trauma. Just because some treat it one way doesn’t mean the entire world needs to do the same. Trauma is a chronic illness that each human being deals with differently. Trauma is a cancer that can eat you from the inside out if you don’t somehow come up with a coping mechanism

the Bhutanese scholar and cancer survivor. “There is no such thing as personal happiness,” he told me. “Happiness is one hundred percent relational.” At the time, I didn’t take him literally. I thought he was exaggerating to make his point: that our relationships with other people are more important than we think. But now I realize Karma meant exactly what he said. Our happiness is completely and utterly intertwined with other people: family and friends and neighbors and the woman you hardly notice who cleans your office. Happiness is not a noun or verb. It’s a conjunction. Connective tissue. Well, are we there yet? Have I found happiness? I still own an obscene number of bags and am prone to debilitating bouts of hypochondria. But I do experience happy moments. I’m learning, as W. H. Auden counseled, to “dance while you can.” He didn’t say dance well, and for that I am grateful. I’m not 100 percent happy. Closer to feevty-feevty, I’d say. All things considered, that’s not so bad. No, not bad at all. Waterford, Virginia, July 2007

COVID-19 is expected to increase the rates of disease in the survivors.

We accept the cures, with the promise of future struggles, in defiance of death.

It's one thing knowing you have people cheering you on, yet another to know they've walked in your footsteps.

There is no such thing as a bad book, I just like some books more than others. - Chris Geiger

We are the crazy, cool cancer misfits trying to find our way after the terrible trauma of treatment. We are everywhere. We are a tribe without even knowing it.

It is not a crime to commit First Degree Writing

Don't worry about whether you can do it, Bailey Bean. Just pretend you can. Pretend enough and it becomes real.

Happiness and sorrow are two sides of the same coin called life. Whatever befalls you, walk on unattached.

Health is real wealth and peace of mind is real happiness. Plant seeds which will bear colorful flowers and make the garden of your life bloom with their fragrance.

Those of us who have been through cancer know that surviving treatment isn’t where the cancer journey ends. In fact, for many of us, this is where the hardest part of the journey begins.

Thank you," he said. "Welcome. Welcome especially to Mr. Coyle Mathis and the other men and women of Forster Hollow who are going to be employed at this rather strikingly energy-inefficient plant. It's a long way from Forster Hollow, isn't it?" "So, yes, welcome," he said. "Welcome to the middle class! That's what I want to say. Although, quickly, before I go any further, I also want to say to Mr. Mathis here in the front row: I know you don't like me. And I don't like you. But, you know, back when you were refusing to have anything to do with us, I respected that. I didn't like it, but I had respect for your position. For your independence. You see, because I actually came from a place a little bit like Forster Hollow myself, before I joined the middle class. And, now you're middle-class, too, and I want to welcome you all, because it's a wonderful thing, our American middle class. It's the mainstay of economies all around the globe!" "And now that you've got these jobs at this body-armor plant," he continued, "You're going to be able to participate in those economies. You, too, can help denude every last scrap of native habitat in Asia, Africa, and South America! You, too, can buy six-foot-wide plasma TV screens that consume unbelievable amounts of energy, even when they're not turned on! But that's OK, because that's why we threw you out of your homes in the first places, so we could strip-mine your ancestral hills and feed the coal-fired generators that are the number-one cause of global warming and other excellent things like acid rain. It's a perfect world, isn't it? It's a perfect system, because as long as you've got your six-foot-wide plasma TV, and the electricity to run it, you don't have to think about any of the ugly consequences. You can watch Survivor: Indonesia till there's no more Indonesia!" "Just quickly, here," he continued, "because I want to keep my remarks brief. Just a few more remarks about this perfect world. I want to mention those big new eight-miles-per-gallon vehicles you're going to be able to buy and drive as much as you want, now that you've joined me as a member of the middle class. The reason this country needs so much body armor is that certain people in certain parts of the world don't want us stealing all their oil to run your vehicles. And so the more you drive your vehicles, the more secure your jobs at this body-armor plant are going to be! Isn't that perfect?" "Just a couple more things!" Walter cried, wresting the mike from its holder and dancing away with it. "I want to welcome you all to working for one of the most corrupt and savage corporations in the world! Do you hear me? LBI doesn't give a shit about your sons and daughters bleeding in Iraq, as long as they get their thousand-percent profit! I know this for a fact! I have the facts to prove it! That's part of the perfect middle-class world you're joining! Now that you're working for LBI, you can finally make enough money to keep your kids from joining the Army and dying in LBI's broken-down trucks and shoddy body armor!" The mike had gone dead, and Walter skittered backwards, away from the mob that was forming. "And MEANWHILE," he shouted, "WE ARE ADDING THIRTEEN MILLION HUMAN BEINGS TO THE POPULATION EVERY MONTH! THIRTEEN MILLION MORE PEOPLE TO KILL EACH OTHER IN COMPETITION OVER FINITE RESOURCES! AND WIPE OUT EVERY OTHER LIVING THING ALONG THE WAY! IT IS A PERFECT FUCKING WORLD AS LONG AS YOU DON'T COUNT EVERY OTHER SPECIES IN IT! WE ARE A CANCER ON THE PLANT! A CANCER ON THE PLANET!

Twenty years ago, when she first started doing Survivor Day, it was easy, she says, but now, who’s left? Maybe you survive cancer, maybe you survive the Holocaust, but life’ll get you every time.

In the 1990s, Barbara Bradfield was among the first women to be treated with a drug, Herceptin, that specifically attacks breast cancer cells. She is the longest survivor of that treatment, with no hint of her cancer remaining.

In the early 1950s, Fanny Rosenow, a breast cancer survivor and cancer advocate, called the New York Times to post an advertisement for a support group for women with breast cancer. Rosenow was put through, puzzlingly, to the society editor of the newspaper. When she asked about placing her announcement, a long pause followed. “I’m sorry, Ms. Rosenow, but the Times cannot publish the word breast or the word cancer in its pages. “Perhaps,” the editor continued, “you could say there will be a meeting about diseases of the chest wall.” Rosenow

Happiness is your inherent nature. In the hustle and bustle of life, you have forgotten a part of yourself, and looking for it outside. Fill this void with happiness that is sustainable, not transitory; that illuminates your life and that of others, that is life giving and so natural.

At last there is an unknown element back in my life. This is how it used to be. This is how I used to do things before the eighties and jobs and money and careers and Thatcher and marriage and mortgages. I was spontaneous, free, even reckless. Things often didn’t work out, but I felt alive. Painfully alive. For the last few years I’ve been feeling painfully dead. That drive, that lust for life that everyone expects you to have after surviving cancer, well it took ten years to arrive, but here it is. I don’t care what anyone thinks of me any more, I’m going to live life to the full, starting with New York.

Work is hazardous to your health, to borrow a book title. In fact, work is mass murder or genocide. Directly or indirectly, work will kill most of the people who read these words... Even if you aren't killed or crippled while actually working, you very well might be while going to work, coming from work, looking for work, or trying to forget about work. The vast majority of victims of the automobile are either doing one of these work-obligatory activities or else fall afoul of those who do them. To this augmented body-count must be added the victims of auto-industrial pollution and work-induced alcoholism and drug addiction. Both cancer and heart disease are modern afflictions normally traceable, directly, or indirectly, to work. Work, then, institutionalizes homicide as a way of life... We kill people in the six-figure range (at least) in order to sell Big Macs and Cadillacs to the survivors. Our forty or fifty thousand annual highway fatalities are victims, not martyrs. They died for nothing -- or rather, they died for work.

Cancer is not a single disease, and it almost certainly can't ever be addressed with a single magical potion. It has to be approached with a variety of protocols. So when well-meaning peopleーor, more infuriatingly, certain cancer organizations that ought to know betterーtalk about finding "the cure" for "this disease", it's a good bet that they are talking a lot of nonsense.

Accidental nuclear war between two superpowers may or may not happen in my lifetime, but if it does, it will obviously change everything. The climate change we're currently worrying about pales in comparison with nuclear winter, where a global dust cloud blocks sunlight for years, much like when an asteroid or supervolcano caused a mass extinction in the past. The 2008 economic turmoil was of course nothing compared to the resulting global crop failures, infrastructure collapse and mass starvation, with survivors succumbing to hungry armed gangs systematically pillaging from house to house. Do I expect to see this in my lifetime? I'd give it about 30%, putting it roughly on par with my getting cancer. Yet we devote way less attention and resources to reducing the risk of nuclear disaster than we do for cancer. And whereas humanity as a whole survives even if 30% get cancer, it's less obvious to what extent our civilization would survive a nuclear Armageddon. There are concrete and straightforward steps that can be taken to slash this risk, as spelled out in numerous reports by scientific organizations, but these never become major election issues and tend to get largely ignored.

Rest too long after an injury and your system powers down, preparing you for a peaceful exit. Fight your way back to your feet, however, and you trigger that magical ON switch that speeds healing hormones to everything you need to get stronger: your bones, brain, organs, ligaments, immune system, even the digestive bacteria in your belly, all get a molecular upgrade from exercise. For that, you can thank your hunter-gatherer ancestors, who evolved to stay alive by staying on the move. Today, movement-as-medicine is a biological truth for survivors of cancer, surgery, strokes, heart attacks, diabetes, brain injuries, depression, you name it.

Two weeks ago, Aaron and Isaac, I learned your mother Laura has breast cancer. My heart feels impaled. These words, so useless and feeble. Laura is only thirty-five years old. Her next birthday will be in only three days. I write this letter to you, my sons, with the hope that one day in the future you will read it and understand what happened to our family. Together, your mother and I have created and nurtured an unbreakable bond that has transformed us into an unlikely team. A Chicano from El Paso, Texas. A Jew from Concord, Massachusetts. I want you to know your mother. She has given me hope when I have felt none; she has offered me kindness when I have been consumed by bitterness. I believe I have taught her how to be tough and savvy and how to achieve what you want around obstacles and naysayers. Our hope is that the therapies we are discussing with her doctors will defeat her cancer. But a great and ominous void has suddenly engulfed us at the beginning of our life as a family. This void suffocates me.

Do you ever think? What? They were lying together on the sofa that had always been there, the crappy beat-up biscuit-colored sofa that was managing, as best it could, its promotion from threadbare junk to holy artifact. You know. What if I don't know? You fucking do. Okay, yeah. Yes. I, too, wonder if Dad worried so much about every single little goddamned thing . . . That he summoned it. Thanks. I couldn't say it. That some god or goddess heard him, one time too many, getting panicky about whether she'd been carjacked at the mall, or had, like, hair cancer . . . That they delivered the think even he couldn't imagine worrying about. It's not true. I know. But we're both thinking about it. That may have been their betrothal. That may have been when they took their vows: We are no longer siblings, we are mates, starship survivors, a two-man crew wandering the crags and crevices of a planet that may not be inhabited by anyone but us. We no longer need, or want, a father. Still, they really have to call him. It's been way too long.

Terri understood...he had to dig deep, beyond the walls and layers of pain and frustration, and reach into that place that held both vulnerability and power; the place where dreams were real and being cancer free was a reality.

We must keep our heads high, stay positive, move forward, and roll with the punches. With that, trust the battle. Trust the struggle. Trust yourself. Trust it, and know you can create your own strength. You have the power to persevere.

Over time I learned that my journey was not over when treatment ended. I had a lot of adjustments to make. I needed to learn to live with cancer. The survivor label is not earned by completing treatment and being deemed cancer free. Instead,

Neuropeptides that have a healthy effect on your immune system include serotonin, dopamine, and relaxin; these are released whenever you feel relaxed and happy. Neuropeptides that have a weakening effect on your immune system, especially over an extended period of time, include cortisol, epinephrine, and adrenaline; these are known as the stress hormones. What makes stress—or any emotion, for that matter—so powerful is that almost every cell in our bodies has the ability to both produce and receive these neuropeptides.3 In other words, the

Green tea (matcha)[38] : Inside green tea are polyphénols which are antioxidants (compounds that protect the body's cells from damage caused by free radicals). They are called catechins (EGCG). A Japanese study carried out on a large number of patients has shown that we could limit the growth of malignant cells as well as the growth of the vessels that nourish them in the context of prostate cancer. On the other hand, it would prevent diseased cells from absorbing the glutamine on which they feed. I take it in the form of tablets and powder which I mix with sparkling water and mint which I drink throughout the day. It is a variety of tea from Japan and I chose it because it has 137 times more EGCG than regular green tea. This makes it one of the most powerful antioxidants in the world. In addition, it has long been considered a real medicine by the samurai ! A tea made to measure for me, isn't it ?

Saying Yes to Life in Spite of Everything: Viktor Frankl The story of Viktor Frankl (1905–1997), an Austrian psychiatrist and neurologist imprisoned in concentration camps during the Nazi Holocaust of WWII, inspired the world after the war. By 1997, when Frankl died of heart failure, his book Man’s Search for Meaning, which related his experiences in the death camps and the conclusions he drew from them, had sold more than 10 million copies in 24 languages. The book’s original title (translated from the German) reveals Frankl’s amazing outlook on life: Saying Yes to Life in Spite of Everything: A Psychologist Experiences the Concentration Camp. In 1942, Frankl and his wife and parents were sent to the Nazi Theresienstadt ghetto in Czechoslovakia, which was one of the show camps used to deceive Red Cross inspectors as to the true purpose and conditions of the concentration camps. In October 1944, Frankl and his wife were moved to Auschwitz, where an estimated 1.1 million people would meet their deaths. Later that month, he was transported to one of the Kaufering labor camps (subcamps of Dachau), and then, after contracting typhoid, to the Türkheim camp where he remained until American troops liberated the camp on April 27, 1945. Frankl and his sister, Stella, were the only ones in his immediate family to survive the Holocaust. In Man’s Search for Meaning, Frankl observed that a sense of meaning is what makes the difference in being able to survive painful and even horrific experiences. He wrote, “We who lived in concentration camps can remember the men who walked through the huts comforting others, giving away their last piece of bread. They may have been few in number, but they offer sufficient proof that everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of human freedoms—to choose one’s own attitude in any given set of circumstances—to choose one’s own way.” Frankl maintained that while we cannot avoid suffering in life, we can choose the way we deal with it. We can find meaning in our suffering and proceed with our lives with our purpose renewed. As he states it, “When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves.” In this beautiful elaboration, Frankl wrote, “Between a stimulus and a response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom. The last of human freedoms is to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances.” 7.2. In recent years, record numbers have visited Auschwitz. The ironic sign above the front gate means “Work sets you free.” TRAUMA IS EVERYWHERE It’s not just veterans, crime victims, abused children, and accident survivors who come face-to-face with trauma. About 75% of Americans will experience a traumatic event at some point in their lives. Women are more likely to be victims of domestic violence than they are to get breast cancer.

The sadness of soon becoming an aged house pet, losing hair, sprawled helplessly in some corner of the house, shrinking with the feeling of being a burden to those around me.

Garlic[43] : This amazing aromatic plant, the most powerful antioxidant known, has been used to treat and cure illnesses through the ages. Even Hippocrates recommended consuming large amounts of crushed garlic as a remedy. A study in China finds that consuming raw garlic regularly cuts the risk of lung cancer in half, and previous studies have suggested that it may also ward off other malignant tumors, such as colon cancer. It is best to let it sit for at least fifteen minutes after the pods have been crushed. This time is needed to release an enzyme (allicin) that produces antifungal and anti-cancer compounds. Alliates (garlic, onion, chives) and their cousins (leek, shallot) improve liver detoxification and therefore help protect our genes from mutations. I take it in three forms: tablet, powder and fresh. I use it in almost all my dishes and sauces, it is the anti-cancer food par excellence. Vegetables[44] : To avoid disease, nothing like a diet rich in raw and organic vegetables. The daily intake of vegetables would prevent cancers of the mouth, pharynx, esophagus, lung, stomach, breast, colon and rectum. I eat it abundantly; you could even say that it has become my staple food. I eat of course all the cabbage, garlic, onion, pepper but also asparagus, mushrooms, leek, cucumber, scallions (green onions), zucchini, celery, all salads, spinach, endives, pickles, radishes, green beans, parsley and aromatic herbs. At first, I ate cooked tomatoes but stopped because they contain too much sugar. Omega 3 :   Omega 3, in cancer, are anti-inflammatory. Omega 6 or linoleic acids (found in sunflower and peanut oils) are inflammatory. You must always have an omega 3 / omega 6 ratio favorable to omega 3. This is why I take capsules of this fatty acid in addition to eating sardines and anchovies[45]. An inflammatory environment is conducive to the formation and proliferation of cancer cells. To restore the balance, it is necessary to consume more foods rich in omega 3 such as fatty fish, rather small ones because of mercury pollution (sardines, anchovies, mackerel, herring), organic eggs or eggs from hens fed with flax, chia seeds and flax seeds, avocados, almonds, olive oil. These good fatty acids help in the prevention of several cancers including breast, prostate, mouth and skin.

The only paid artistic work he managed to secure, as far as Elijah knew, consisted of taking photographs and designing posters for an all-female, all-cancer-survivor bluegrass band called Nocturnal Remissions.

Fuck anyone who judges how survivors deal with their trauma. Just because some treat it one way doesn’t mean the entire world needs to do the same. Trauma is a chronic illness that each human being deals with differently. Trauma is a cancer that can eat you from the inside out if you don’t somehow come up with a coping mechanism.

When a loved one battles cancer, it is through unconditional acts of love and spiritual support that inspires the determination to prevail.

A story told in pieces Skies broken Biomes created under such pains The body building unique tumors The turmoil just constantly eats The pain sighs and comes back beats Under this spell, under this pieces I want to live, I want to be bones The cancer, the breast cancer survivor I survived, in the loss of my left I suffered but i survived I lost the right I fought never failed but under such anguish I survived..

The dream of every cell is to become two cells’ said François Jacob, the most lyrical revolutionary of molecular biology. No cell lives the dream so wholly or so senselessly as a cancer cell, turning dream to nightmare. Nothing else captures the myopic immediacy of natural selection so starkly. The moment is all that matters for selection: there is no foresight, no balance, no slowing at the prospect of doom. Just the best ploy for the moment, for me, right now, not for the many, and often mistaken. Cancer cells die in piles, necrotic flesh worse than the trenches. The decimated survivors mutate, evolve, adapt, exploit their shifting environment, selfish to the bitter end. Their horror is that they know no bounds. They will eat away at our flesh to fuel their pointless lives and deaths, until, if we are unlucky, they take us too. I am writing about cancer, but must confess that I have the pointless greed and destruction of humanity at the back of my mind. May we find it within ourselves to be better than cancer cells.

While today may seem challenging, it’s not. Some people are visiting cancer hospitals for treatment. Their determination should demonstrate the opportunities you have today, they they hope one day they have too!” - Chris Geiger

While today may seem challenging, it’s not. Some people are visiting cancer hospitals for treatment. Their determination should demonstrate the opportunities you have today, which they pray one day they will have too!” - Chris Geiger

Fifteen years after being diagnosed with cancer, I’ve become something I never imagined I’d be. I’m a survivor.

What is fear, if not the illusion of what can or can't happen?

Red Light Therapy (RLT) is also a new alternative method of healing the body from protocol side effects and helps with external scarring. It is still in its infancy stage, yet deserves more delving into the research that is being done. It appears to be safe and unlike Ultraviolet light, may prove to be an option to help alleviate internal fibrotic tissue.

Another new alternative possibility is adding hydrogen-rich water to your daily diet, best taken on an empty stomach. The research is in its infancy, yet the benefits are all positive, especially around fibrotic tissue and complete health.

Prevention Plain and simple, cancer cannot live in an alkaline and oxygenated environment. That’s it! Cancer loves acidity, sugar (which is highly acidic), and less oxygenated places in the body, to grow and develop. When a person is diagnosed with cancer of any kind and if time is not of the essence to treat it, a three-month regime of organic alkaline nutrition and oxygenation under professional supervision would be ideal to return the body to health or reduce the severity of cancer. This may be something to consult a naturopathic physician or qualified health professional about. Keep in mind that there are places where people who were considered terminally ill have gone for treatment and left weeks later cancer-free. This is a fact.

With all that is known in naturopathic medicine, you no longer need to take the common cold lying down. High doses of Vitamin C either intravenously or by mouth can be taken in large quantities throughout the day. If your GI tract can handle it, consider that 20k – 30k milligrams of Vitamin C will put an end to a cold within two to three days.

When beginning a new routine of vitamins and minerals for the body's health, it is important to read the recommended daily allowance (RDA) on each package, then consider multiplying the dosage by two, three, or four, depending on the product and what you’d like to achieve. The RDA is often for healthy maintenance guidelines and is oftentimes insufficient to achieve a noticeable difference. After taking the increased dose for three to four weeks, see if you feel a difference. If you feel a difference, lower the dose by one for another two to three weeks, after which you can either lower it again or follow the recommended amount. You get to choose. Note: If you’re familiar with muscle testing, that may be a good guide to help select dosage. Instead of taking all of your supplements in the morning, consider incorporating them into shakes and titrating them into your system throughout your day. Some supplements will tell you if they are more effective when taken on an empty stomach. Getting maximum benefit from your supplements is key. Immune System and Fighting the Common Cold

The ULTIMATE Lifestyle The Ultimate Diet – Live organic produce and wild fish caught in uncontaminated waters. Many folks resist this because they feel it’s way too expensive. Granted, it’s a bit more. However, to create a genuinely healthy body, you must fill it with high-grade clean nutrition. It’s time to realize that affordability is a matter of priority rather than limited finance. As you look to create your nutritional palate of foods, think of it this way: If it’s from the earth and comes out of salt or fresh water to the table, it’s probably good for you. In addition, the only liquid for the Ultimate Diet is clean mountain water and sometimes distilled water. A minimum daily consumption amount to keep your body hydrated is half your body weight in ounces. Distilled water is considered ‘hungry water’ because of its ability to attract unwanted particles throughout the body and is ideal when it’s time for a detoxification cleansing.

Great Yoga Studio Flexibility, stamina, endurance, peace of mind, and more, can be found in yoga. There’s no substitute for yoga when it comes to combining the body’s flexibility and learning how to gain laser focus on your breath and being present. If you are adventurous, hot yoga is a real treat. Hot yoga helps make it easier and quicker for your body to become flexible. Once you become a yogi by committing to six months to a year of practice, it will surely become part of your new lifestyle.

Its Not a F*%king Boob Job

Jeg tror, grunden til, at jeg kan bevare positiviteten, er, at jeg aldrig slår for store brød op. Jeg vælger IKKE at bestige bjerge.

There is that one burning question we all want to know the answer to, but, may be too afraid to ask. What are my chances of surviving this diagnosis? It seemed like every web site gave me a different answer. They put a number in my mind and in hind sight, the number in my mind should have been 100…..100% chance of my survival…nothing less! Never let statistics get in your head. You are an individual, not a number, and you will make your way through this with your own strength and grace.

No hair? Don’t care!!

Without hair, A queen is still a queen’.

Once preachers start to identify the Context of Reality for a biblical passage, our unspoken expository bans become apparent. By an expository ban I refer to those aspects of reality that we tend to avoid or that are culturally forbidden to mention from the pulpit. Sexuality, emotions, famines, joys, tsunamis, celebrations, dreams, promotions, murders, crime victims, cancer survivors, and injustice are part of everyday life, but we avoid them.

London’s Hale Clinic

I decided to call Virginia governor Terry McAuliffe for advice on getting the DNC back on its feet. I knew he’d just be getting out of church. “Terry,” I said. “I’m sitting here in Debbie’s office about to meet the staff. What should I do?” “Paint that damn office blue!” he said. I guess he didn’t like her Florida pink walls any more than I did. I knew I’d keep some part of the office pink out of respect for Debbie, who was a breast cancer survivor.

And if you really can’t think of the right thing to say, send chocolate.

So many women have cancer now. Do you think a new esthetic can develop? Cancer beauty? I mean, if there could be heroin chic, the esthetic of the death-wishing drug addict? Will non-cancerous women be begging their cosmetic surgeons to give them fake node implants under their chins and around their necks? Under their arms? In their groins? So sexy, that fullness. And it works so well as an anti-aging technique, to fill out that sagging turkey neck. Who wouldn't want it? And the jewelry, the titanium pellets piercing those tits. So S&M/bondage." Dunja kept talking in Nathan's head as he segued into a parallel inner dialogue with her about health and evolution, about the theory that concepts of beauty were not just concepts, but perceptions of indicators of reproductive potential and therefore of youth, about selfish genes using our bodies as vehicles only to perpetuate themselves, about how perhaps cancer genes could begin to make their own case for reproductive immortality as well, and so they too would put immense pressure on cultural acceptance of formerly taboo concepts of beauty, concepts which used to indicate disease and nearness to death but now mesmerized and seduced and mimicked youth and ripeness and health, and so her little fantasy of a culture forming around her own dire straits could theoretically... Nathan could only just manage to keep looking into her searching eyes, feeling at that moment very sentimental and ordinary, and therefore mute. Could he really say anything about classical concepts of art, and therefore beauty, based on harmony, as opposed to modern theories, post-industrial-revolution, post-psychoanalysis, based on sickness and dysfunction? Could he make a case for her new, diseased self as the most avant-garde form of womanly beauty? He didn't dare, but she did.

The Etiquette of Illness, a book from 2004 by a social worker and psychotherapist named Susan Halpern, who is herself a cancer survivor. The subtitle is What to Say When You Can’t Find the Words. But it’s really about what to do when you feel scared that doing something, if it turns out to be the wrong thing, might be worse than doing nothing at all.

As moms we put ourselves last all of the time. Now is the time to stop that. For the next few months in treatment, your life and your family's lives will revolve around how you feel, so make sure you do things that make you feel good. Find food you like, a God you trust, and friends that support you.

Laura was not a lonely teenaged girl anymore. She was fifty-five years old. She was a mother, a cancer survivor, a businesswoman. This was her life, Not Nick,

I don’t want to get all new-agey now, but there are lessons to be learned from going through this horrible experience. Many women, including me, learned to accept help. We learned that being sick is not being weak. We learned to be humble in the face of our bodies. We learned to be our own advocates. We learned to feel pretty in spite of the mirror. We learned the importance of slowing down. We learned who our friends are. We learned we can help others with our support and our stories. There are a lot of life-affirming things you can do. I wrote this book.

came to understand for the first time ever the importance of being healthy, and I don’t mean the universalizing and troubling concept of “diet conscious” our culture currently prefers, but the kind of healthy that encourages and cultivates a knowledge and awareness of your unique body and what it can be reasonably asked to do, and to never feel shame if your body does not operate by the same rules as someone else’s body. I’m talking about a healthy that is rooted in self-determination and individual autonomy, and is thus applicable to a spectrum of bodies, including professional athletes, cancer survivors, gym rats, the doctor-phobic, the poor, joggers, and folks with a limited supply of spoons, a healthy that excludes no one and that is specific and relative to the individual.

Initially, after David’s diagnosis, I would cringe when I read books or articles by cancer survivors who stated that cancer had been a gift in their lives. How could all that David endured be viewed as a gift? The invasive surgery, the weeks of chemotherapy and radiation: a gift? Yet, after the cancer, David would often reach for my hand and say, “If it is cancer that is responsible for our new relationship, then it was all worth it.” And I’d reluctantly agree that cancer had been a gift in our lives. We’d both seen the other alternative: patients and survivors who had become bitter and angry, and neither one of us wanted to become that.

Admit it, "Lord I'm Not Done Yet" Live it, "Lord I'm Not Done Yet" Shout it, "Lord I'm Not Done Yet