3 Lessons I Learned From Chemo (and Life)

Greetings from chemo 2, day 8. First things first…to help this make sense…my chemo cycle is every 21 days, starting on the day I get my infusion. I’ll reference “chemo day _” often, as this is how cancer on chemo is charted by my medical team (and now me:)

With that out of the way, while this season happens to include cancer, what it’s teaching me reaches way beyond treatment side effects and infusion chairs.

Lesson 1: Paying Attention Allows for Response Versus Reaction

One of the first things I’ve realized is that when you slow down (or are forced to:), it’s easier to pay attention to what’s happening right where you are. I started doing this by keeping a cancer journal. Not your traditional journal, this one is more of a tracker…meds I take each day, what I eat, how I feel, what shows up in/on my body, and when.

Looking back at my first chemo cycle, I can now see patterns. I know when side effects tend to start, which ones showed up, and what actually helped. That awareness alone has changed how I move through this, and is making things much more manageable!

It doesn’t make hard things easy, but it keeps them from knocking me completely off balance. Whether it’s chemo, burnout, grief, or just the weight of life, when we slow down enough to notice what’s happening instead of pushing through it, we give ourselves room to respond with a little more wisdom and a little less panic.

That’s how I ended up using a simple baking soda and salt rinse for mouth soreness before things escalated, and how I know what days to avoid Indian food🤦🏽‍♀️ (I learned the hard way that even mild Indian is gasoline on a chemo belly fire🔥!) While I know things may get harder, for today they are better than expected! By being present and aware, I’m already able to see how far I’ve come AND I have a bunch of tricks and tools, and a whole lotta faith, to help me through the tough times when they arrive.

Lesson 2: Receiving

The second lesson surprised me more than I expected.

If you know me, you know I’m much better at giving than receiving. I’m quite independent, don’t like asking for help, and as the offspring of Dottie and Frank, I have more than my share of stubbornness. What I’m learning, through meals dropped off, messages sent, prayers offered, and lovely gifts that arrive in the mail , is that receiving is not something we do passively. It’s something we practice.

What started as a joke, the green turbin is truly the gift that keeps on giving, makes me laugh and it keeps my head sooooo warm!

When someone gives and we receive with a genuine thank you, something completes itself. They feel useful. We feel supported. And the connection becomes mutual instead of one-sided. All of that matters more than we realize. It’s ShineForward✨ in action!

I can’t help but think about how many years I spent trying to carry everything by myself, professionally and personally, believing that strength meant handling it all. The stress, the anxiety, the constant pushing, none of that made life better. It just made it heavier, and it made me sick. This lesson isn’t about cancer. It’s about learning, sometimes late, that we were never meant to muscle our way through life alone.

Lesson 3: Hard Seasons Have a Way of Clearing the Noise

The third lesson has come into focus with startling clarity.

For a long time, I prayed to God for clarity. What should I speak about? Who am I meant to serve? How do I use my voice in a way that actually matters? Should this be my job or should I get a JOB? And then life happened, not gently. And suddenly, I could see.

Cancer didn’t give me a purpose. It sharpened it.

It stripped away the constant striving and left me with what actually matters. We’re not meant to carry our pain, our stress, our grief, our fear, or even our successes and celebrations in isolation. What we’ve lived through, the valleys we’ve walked, the things we’ve survived and achieved…those experiences don’t just shape us. They connect us.

That’s where ShineForward✨ lives and breathes.

ShineForward✨: Live It. Own It. Share It.

Live it! by paying attention to what’s really happening in your life and in your body, instead of pushing past it.

Own it! by accepting the truth about what you’ve been through, without shame or minimizing. You’ve already overcome EVERYTHING you’ve overcome 💪

Share it! by letting your story be a bridge for someone else who needs to know they’re not alone.

This is my journey, yes. But these lessons belong to all of us.

I’ll keep living it.
I’ll keep owning it.
And I’ll keep sharing it.

And I hope, in whatever season you’re in, you’ll do the same.

Until next time, ShineForward✨ friends!