I know you remember the moment you heard, “You have breast cancer”. Those words began a long journey with many possible roadblocks and detours. You will all be at different points on your cancer timeline. Perhaps you have just been diagnosed, are continuing with treatment, or even managing a reoccurrence. Because each of you is more than a statistic, your journey will be unique. The path to follow must be the one that is right for you. At each turn, you will be faced with many hard decisions. You certainly did not choose this challenge, but it is now in front of you. Deciding what is important, how you want to live, and setting your priorities are some of the many demands of this disease. The challenge is how do you want to move forward towards healing which is finding your wholeness and balance. Cure is the absence of physical disease. Everyone hopes for a cure. Even if you cannot achieve a cure, you can and must seek your definition of healing.

I finally caught up on my television viewing and watched the Friends Reunion show and the first two episodes of And Just Like That… Through the nostalgia, out-loud belly laughs and floods of tears (there were tons of each), one thought dominated: this is what support looks like. Sure, it was just TV, but if I could feel the connection and love through my 29-inch screen, then so can other people. I’m pretty sure that’s why these shows resonate. Support is survival. I need it and you do too, especially when you’re living with cancer, overcoming it, in the healing process, in remission or even know someone going through breast cancer. Asking for what you need though can be tough. We’re hardwired to put on a brave face or listen to whatever other crap messaging we tell ourselves we need to do. And it’s never worth it. So instead of being an island, try one or all of these suggestions to give and to get the support you deserve.

Do you ever think that you have another tumour? I don’t mean a recurrence with a breast cancer lesion, but a secondary cancer. And if you do, do these dark thoughts catch you by surprise in random pockets of moments, like when you feel an ache in your shoulder, or a knotted muscle along your spine, or when you take a deep breath and experience a sharpness of pain before you fully exhale? When this happens, do you immediately think, “fuck, I have a tumour,” and then have to talk yourself down from this mental, paranoid ledge? I do.

Tell me if any of this rings a bell…

The Beginning: Get up, find a lump, feel confused, panic inside, see the doctor, see a specialist, get a mammogram, see an oncologist, have an ultrasound, get an MRI, biopsy the lump, do it all over again and again and again, receive a breast cancer diagnosis, feel in shock, go home, make a plan, fall into bed and don’t fall asleep.

Self-care. It’s not a phrase that even flickered across my radar when I was diagnosed with breast cancer, let alone after my surgery or during treatment. But it should have. And, no, it’s not a selfish act.