Learning To Accept Realities and Laugh A Little More

Two months since I found out about the cancer in my body, I try to enforce a change in my lifestyle.

Nothing swiftly radical: just a change of pace, actually a slow-down in the work place, less crowds,  more quiet time, more veggies in each meal, fruits each day, Zumba even right after the once-a-week chemo treatment, and the hardest part, learning to avoid stress and trying to sleep before midnight.

A  few well-meaning friends are warmer now, sending me prayers, fruits, and positive vibes.

Some close family members call and show up more often.

My own staff  struggle to work better, to avoid causing me undue stress.

Acquaintances at my Clients' workplaces are sympathetic when they learn of my condition or 

take notice of the headband I wear to cover my baldness. 

Neighbours, even strangers I meet on the road and in the clinics and a few public places look kindly.

I feel blessed for the tireless support of my Beloved who has even become more affectionate since the cancer set in.  She patiently accompanies me in the weekly blood works and the 6-hour chemo session each week, and on top of these, has to go through what could be an ordeal of listening to  a litany of my reads, discoveries, and complaints as I cope with the mild side effects of the ongoing treatment.

The handful of well-trained nurses and caring staff under Surgeon-Onco Dr. Romeo Diaz of the Springfield Breast Care Center in SMX are like family now.  Friends and colleagues from long ago suddenly make their presence felt and friends of friends reach out with words of Faith and courage. 

I thank God for all the support, as I go through the changes in my lifestyle, and in the way I feel about the reality of a Stage 3B cancer in my body,  and the "85% recurrence rate as Stage 4" 

(a new reality that I have to put on a watch forever starting on the third month after what I am hoping will just have to be a partial mastectomy.)   

But there is One Reality I realise will never change.

I refer to them as an Odd Couple, not to mean oddness for strange, but odd for being different and totally separate from the support system described above. Before any of this life-changing experience happened,  I had felt they never really accepted me despite my many efforts to reach out in both subtle and open ways.

I struggle not to get hurt each time I am in the same place with the Odd Couple, a situation that couldn't be avoided.   For the longest time, I had been hoping to cultivate at least a  friendship,  and I had thought my new situation with a fatal disease could become an opening.

I hoped that perhaps they can become compassionate out of pity for someone who has cancer, or be gentler out of plain courtesy to an almost-elderly,  or just  kinder to someone who will live "no more than five years".

I was wrong in thinking that things between us would change once they learn of my condition.


Every day, I pray for The Miracle of Healing. Heal my body of the disease, and Heal my Soul of the hurt. This is the cross I carry each day, the One Reality  I have to learn to accept so I can laugh inside a little more.

Losing Hair To Cancer But Gaining A Different Perspective

I thought I was getting prepared for it.  Oncologist Dr Romeo Diaz had told me in the most certain terms that hair loss will begin after the third chemotherapy session. Other patients who have gone through the ordeal tossed me ideas about shaving to "restore self-confidence" and "preserve self-image."

But when the usually thick lustre of hair started breaking and falling off my head,
I got a little scared.  Here was an actual part of me that was going away.

I force a smile, thinking of how I used to complain over my frequent trips to the salon each month on account of a healthy fast-growing raven mass of hair.  I couldn't have imagined that my visit to the salon early last month was going to be my last ---- until I grow it back after months of treatment.

Now I collect loose strands on the pillow,  the back of the sofa,  the computer table,  and off my neck, shoulders and arms.  I look closely at the thinned-out strands and realised how they had lost all lustre and luminosity.

I comb my fingers gently through my head, and at the end of each stroke, there's quite a handful of the 'crowning glory' strands that easily land on the palm of my hands. I bathe under a slow shower, careful not to wash away the roots. But the bathroom floor drain collects an amount that frightens me.
I can only wish to slow it down.


It's just been a month since I first confirmed about the cancer in my body.
But the various tests,  visits to the doctors, and subsequently the weekly blood tests, and chemo sessions and now, side trips to nurses who administer boosters to elevate my white blood cell count do not seem so recent.


I  try to look past the physicality now.

Before any of these happened, I had been in a race with life to get it all in. To accomplish as much in a shorter span of time. To achieve more than what is expected.

I chose not to slow down; on the contrary, like most of us in modern society,  I pushed myself to run ahead and overtake time. To rephrase Jordan Matter in #DancersAmongUs, what could have been a light jog became a sprint.

And "the faster we run, the less we see."   I've been sprinting big leaps the past three decades, over-achieving and collecting 'big treasures but sacrificing many little gems along the way."

Now I want to seize each moment,  celebrate the everyday miracles, and dance while I can.

Seeking What IT Means

Seeking What It Means To Have Breast Cancer 

With chemotherapy now underway, and surgery forthcoming when the 6cm tumor shrinks,

and while the nagging scientific hows and medical wherefores are momentarily silenced, I turn inward to find answers to why cancer did happen.... To me.

I must have forgotten something.
Perhaps I had been too hooked-up in work, in achieving, in serving others, in beating deadlines to include self-imposed ones. Managing stress had become more of a way of life.
And I had forgotten to learn to have fun, to slow down, to spend more time away from work, to imbue Nature as I once had in my youth. Or to just sit around with loved ones doing nothing.

Friends and family say it's time to slow down.
Surgeon-oncologist Dr. Romeo Diaz says it is a wake-up call. And arrogant me wonders:
a wake-up call to what?

All along, I had thought of myself invincible. The rock my Beloved and the entire family can always depend on; the force behind the corporate leadership; the wings beneath many aspirations. Now, I have to steer for My Own Path, to conquer the disease, and not be engulfed by it.

A  close cousin implies that the meaning of it could be one of karmic effect,
a life lesson by Fate, where I am being taught Humility because I too am suddenly vulnerable when I had thought I was indestructible....

A  twist of fate perhaps, where suffering has to surface to bring out an Inner Strength.


The purpose, the raison d'etat (the reason for being) behind WHY the cancer is there must have a larger usefulness, a higher motivation, a deeper merit.

Perhaps it is a way to Pay Forward. A time to payback and give thanks for the blessings
I have reaped in life, (when I'm not even supposed to be here.)


As I approach the twilight, I had feared getting old, and getting old alone. FOGO.
But being told  "no more than 5 years",  I fear no more...

With very little Time left, my  pursuits for the advocacy film, the illustrated book and Europe have become more serious NOW than at any other moment before.