Making a Difference – THE ROS1ders PRIME Summit and My Annual LCAM Fundraiser
Back in August, The ROS1ders held our first ever in-person conference, the PRIME Summit. We had originally planned to hold the conference in May of 2020 but postponed it due to Covid. The event was fantastic and included presentations by…
Inked! Why I Got a Tattoo with My Daughter
I never wanted a tattoo.* Not even a little bit. Not before my diagnosis, and certainly not after. I mean, it took me a decade to commit to getting braces. Getting a permanent tattoo with a terminal diagnosis? Do you…
Part 2: I Did Another Thing — Lisa’s Search for Meaning
During my psilocybin trip, I spent hours seeing fractals stretching out into infinity; every window opened up into infinite more windows. Some find glimpsing infinity like this (or even contemplating it by looking at the vast ocean, hiking in a…
Part 1: I Did a Thing (Psilocybin)
I did a thing. Back in January, I tried psilocybin (aka “magic mushrooms”). I wouldn’t ordinarily admit to partaking of an illegal Schedule I substance on a public blog, but in this case, I received the drug legally as a…
For a Terminal Cancer Patient, Good News Always has an Asterisk
I’m often explicitly encouraged by lung cancer advocacy organizations, “tell us when you have a big milestone to celebrate so we can splash it on social media.” So here it is: my youngest child graduated high school last week! I…
Honoring one of my Guardian Angels on my 10 Year “Cancerversary”
As I have mentioned previously, unlike many cancer patients, I make it a point not to mark my “cancerversaries.” The day I was diagnosed was pretty freaking terrible, and I take Deepak Chopra’s caution to heart: “If your attention is…
Grief is Love (Update #29)
Traditional Chinese Medicine (“TCM”) associates the lungs with grief, so when too much grief is present, it can weaken the lungs. I don’t necessarily give this philosophy a ton of credence, but I nevertheless worry about how experiencing grief can…
LCAM 2023 FUNdraiser – Join me for a Zentangle class!
Oh wow, it’s already mid-November — I’m a bit tardy to welcome you to Lung Cancer Awareness Month! The world feels especially bleak these days, and it’s incumbent on each of us to contribute light where we can. So, it’s…
Bracing for Life (Update #28)
I got braces a couple weeks ago. I still can’t quite wrap my head around it. I’ve known I needed them for years. I was in the midst of treatment for TMJ when I got diagnosed with lung cancer and…
Cancer Stages
There’s a lot of emphasis in oncology on “staging a patient.” That’s a bit of a misnomer. What the docs really mean when they refer to staging a patient is staging the cancer (how much it has spread), not the…
