Life After Chemotherapy

It was in the summer of 2006. I went to my regular doctor for a regular checkup. And then he noticed that I had some rash under my right arm. He didn't say anything except, I'm just going to send you to a specialist. Sure enough, she say it is breast cancer. And I say, are you sure? Because you know, you're in disbelief at that point.

I started chemotherapy two days after that visit. So I took chemo for a year, for the entire year. It was really hard. You feel like a truck is running over you, something like that, like you get a really bad flu or something. It's terrible. Everything hurts, your bones.

After I finished chemotherapy, I went back to my regular life. My body was broken down from all of the chemicals in my system. So I say I need to take care of my body. So I need to change my lifestyle and in terms of what I eat and in terms of what I do every day.

But then soon enough, I found out about the Cancer Support Community. And I went there. It's a wonderful place. They had exercise classes. They had cooking classes. And then I started going to the nutrition classes. There was a nutritionist there very, very helpful.

You can see sort of in the middle of broccoli, like the white in the middle. I'm a registered dietitian. And I'm also a chef. What you eat plays big into how you feel and into your health.

When I had my first meeting, I started crying. So I said, well, I'm crying because I have cancer. And everybody say, well, me too, me too, me too. Me too. I realized that there was many other people in the same situation. That was a good feeling.

I was very young when my brother was diagnosed with leukemia. And I saw him go through chemotherapy. He was able to recover just fine. But I got to kind of see it, how cancer can really impact your life and just how hard it is. So just kind of having that experience made me want to help other people who've gone through that same experience. Has larger stems on it, you can actually roast that.

You know, I have many more like this. Oh, you do?

This is-- I love this. While she cooks, she talks about this is good for fiber. This has a lot of anti-inflammatories. And it was a change of life for me. I never used to really cook. So I started cooking healthy and paying attention to what I eat every day.

It's very good to be surrounded by people in the same situation, because you exchange ideas. Like you say, I'm having this side effect. And I don't know what to do. And somebody knows. Somebody has tried something. And you get tips on how to manage the side effects, on how to do things better. And also, you make friends.

It has made a difference in my life, because I feel great. I really feel great. The doctor said, you have 40% chance of surviving this. And it's been 10 years. So something is working.

In the future, I really don't know. I can tell you honestly that I don't know. Once you get cancer, you live one day at a time really. I can never say that I am cured, because I don't know. But I'm fine today. And that's what counts, one day at a time.