It was a year ago I published my book ‘Eighteen and Cancer‘. Writing a book is hard, or so I learned, while doing so about something so personal is even harder. My intention with publishing it was twofold: (i) help others by sharing my story about the diagnosis and how I overcame it – not from the perspective of a misery memoir (which would’ve been very easy to do considering the topic, for sure much less in service of others), rather what happens in your mind when faced with such an extreme event and (ii) raise money and awareness for Bator Tabor (Camp Courage) in Hungary. Happy to say that both were achieved in spades and I’m grateful for your help with the second one!
Something else did happen though, which took me by surprise. After reading the book friends and strangers reached out and openly shared how cancer has impacted their lives, be it directly or indirectly (through family, friends, coworkers and so on). For most I could tell that this was the first time they spoke up about it, which I truly appreciated. It turns out that the book served not only as a conversation starter but (without sounding too pretentious hopefully) gave people the permission to speak up. This was completely unexpected and definitely unplanned!
Life never ceases to amaze me.