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Thank you 2011; Heads up 2012

Hope your 2011 has been great and that your 2012 will be your best year yet! I wouldn’t have had it any other way, at home or at work.

The reflective moments to relish success or former days of glory are fun but not frequent. Life has taught me to save time for those moments but today has no time available for reflection on the past. With YACC’s team, momentum, and plan for the future, it’s easy to understand why the future is our focus.

A few weeks ago the YACC board of directors approved a new five-year strategic plan.

You would easily identify many of the big items: growth of programs reaching many more young adults, growth of the Shave for the Brave to new markets, growth of partnerships and sponsors who believe in our work, and enhanced engagement of survivors and young adults in our work.

Anyone who follows YACC would not be surprised to see a theme of growth. 

Anyone who knows the issues facing young adults with cancer and the major deficit of customized resources for this population would understand the reason for our growth.

What you likely wouldn’t know is how ambitious our plans are. 

After my first transplant my docs told me at my two-year anniversary my risk for relapse would drop substantially. I focused my energy on that anniversary, I visualized my celebration party regularly when I would “clinch the cup” and on April 13, 2001, I celebrated. A few weeks later my blood levels started to slowly drop; three months later my leukemia relapsed.

Lesson: aim high.

I focused on my goal, put all my energy into and I nailed it. Better to aim high and miss than aim low and nail it.

I’ve taken that personal lesson and applied it to YACC. Our new strategic plan aims to grow revenue by 500 per cent over the next five years to $4.4M in 2016.

Like I said, ambitious.

In July this year we opened registration for YACC’s 2011 Survivor Conference with two emails to our health partners across the country. We had 100 applications for 80 spots. We stopped promotion three months before the event. The conference was an incredible milestone for YACC: our biggest support event yet.

The demand for our programs is driving our ambitious planning. Some might say we’re crazy to project that kind of growth. We are crazy, crazy about changing lives, and from my seat our plan is even more essential than ambitious. I bet the young adults who have yet to experience a YACC support event would agree with me.

Here’s to a fantastic holiday season with a little time to reflect on the wins you have had in 2011 and the best year yet for all of us.

Always...
Live life.  Love life.

Geoff

10 years, 10 thank yous

It is no coincidence that I am celebrating the 10^th anniversary of my second transplant on Thanksgiving weekend. It has been the most amazing 10 years; to say I am thankful for them is a gigantic understatement.

Here are a few people I'd like to thank for helping me achieve this milestone:

10. My docs and other health advisors: You have provided information and guidance. You have provided hope, and when you didn’t provide hope you provided motivation for me to beat the odds. Thank you.

9. Mentors and colleagues: Your gift of time, wisdom, energy, commitment, and friendship has changed my life and helped enhance YACC’s efforts to change the lives of others. Thank you.

8. Survivor buddies: The courage you display in the face of such massive adversity is inspiring; your honesty and willingness to help others is a gift to me and all those in YACC’s survivor family. Thank you.

7. Friends: “If you have one true friend, you have more than your share.” – Thomas Fuller. I have several true friends from before, through, and beyond my cancer challenges. You make the valleys more bearable and the peaks more enjoyable.  Thank you.

6. Family: One of the keys to my survival. I would not be here without your love and support--literally. Thank you.

5. Dad: Most dads give their children the gift of life once, my dad has done it three times. Dad, your stem cells have enabled me to live the most incredible 10 years of life. Here’s to many more decades of amazing. Thank you.

4. Kane: Your smile and laugh light me up. Your naps on my chest are one of my favourite things. You have brought out such love from your sisters and given Mommy and I a renewed appreciation for the blessings in our life, especially the three major ones. You are the happiest most easy-going baby ever and I love you forever and for always. Thank you.

3. Mira: Your sensitivity and thoughtfulness provides an important example for me every day. I love that you love dancing with me, cuddling with me first thing in the morning, and taking turns feeding each other at meal times. You are the sweetest thing in my life and I love you forever and for always. Thank you.

2. Adia: Your birth was the second miracle (of four) in my life. You pushed my boundary of hope. You are precocious, girly, and a great big sister and I love you for it. I love that you love dancing with me, climbing all over me, and making art for my office. You are the sweetest thing in my life and I love you forever and for always. Thank you.

1. Karen: Before I fell in love with you, I was living with a two-year deadline, expecting my cancer to come back for the third and final time. You opened my heart when it was closed; you pushed me to live more in my heart and less in my head; and you are an amazing wife, mom, and friend. You are more beautiful inside than out, and you know how hot I think you are! I love you forever and for always.  Thank you.

I’ve always loved the tune "Lucky Man" from The Verve, long before I had any idea just how lucky I am.

A decade into this remission, the best decade of my life, here’s to many more decades.

Always…
Live life.  Love life.

Geoff

50/50 gets a 70/30

I busted out laughing the first time I saw a trailer for 50/50. My laughs were interrupted by flashbacks prompted by scenes mirroring my life during diagnosis, active treatment and recovery such as shaving my head and the feeling of being “fine” (aka numb).

I loved the film. It feels like an authentic account of a young adult’s journey through cancer. However there is one glaring omission that requires clarity, in my opinion.

The 70

The film does a great job of representing so many of the major issues facing young adults dealing with cancer. Adam, the survivor, is encompassed by a “fog” upon hearing the “C” word, which is immediately combined with a trip to Google for more info. The relationship challenges—parental, intimate, and friends—are featured prominently in the story. The chemo-room—a right of passage for all young adult survivors—features friendly survivors who likely graduated with our parents or grandparents.

Rage makes an appearance, and it was great to see. Great because it’s real, and it’s even better that Will Reiser (the writer of the screenplay and a survivor) had the courage to include this, which almost gives permission for other guy survivors to let that out. For many of us, including me, that doesn’t come easily.

Kyle’s (Seth Rogan) effort to connect with his friend, despite his immaturity, is a testament to all of those friends of ours who made huge effort to understand, be there, and help in any way they could. If you had even one of these friends, you were blessed.

While I laughed my ass off watching the trailer, it prompted me to wonder where my buddies got those clippers they used to shave my head prior to starting chemo!  I still haven’t gotten a definitive answer.

I laughed while I watched the movie, and truly loved how so many of the scenes were as if they were written based on my story, not Will’s. Reality is that as young adults dealing with cancer our stories have much more in common than not. 50/50 sheds light on so many of these points of connection between young adults. This is a great service for the young adult cancer movement.

The 30

While it is authentic on so many fronts, the major issue I have with this film is that the uninformed masses who watch 50/50 will leave misinformed on the number one issue facing young adults after diagnosis: Isolation.

This, THE NUMBER ONE issue faced after diagnosis, wasn’t raised.

Challenges with fertility, friendship, loss of career, fear of dying as you are just starting to live, are important messages for the masses to hear and understand, but I feel a responsibility to ensure they know these issues—and many more—are so much heavier when wrapped in a blanket of isolation from other young adults with cancer.

Isolation from other young adults with cancer is the defining element of a young adults experience with cancer. Superhero researcher Dr. Brad Zebrack’s 2006 research showed we want to connect with other young adult survivors more than we want support from anyone else. In fact, his study showed 100 per cent of young adult survivors put opportunities to meet with other young adult survivors as a top 5 need (support from family and friends was a top 5 issue for 62 per cent of those same survivors).

YACC is dedicated to eliminating the isolation for young adults with cancer, and although 50/50 doesn’t address this issue, we thought the movie itself was a fantastic opportunity to connect our current network of survivors with more of the thousands not yet in our network.

This opportunity lead to the Give or Get campaign (www.giveorget.ca) which will see young adult survivors across the country connect and watch 50/50 together.

If you, or someone you know, was diagnosed with cancer between 15-39 please share the campaign site with them so they can request a ticket. If you have $12.75 to buy a ticket so a survivor can see the film, that would be awesome too!

A gift of $12.75 will give a young adult a ticket to a movie, but more importantly, it’s a ticket to a network of peers who truly get what they are living.

50/50 isn’t just raising the issues facing young adults with cancer, it will bring hundreds more of them out of isolation and that not so simple step will change their life forever.

Always…
Live life. Love life.

Geoff

Beautiful Dangerous Ambition

"If you use all your energy for living you have none left for healing."

My mom told me that when I was recovering from my first and second transplants.

I believe it is a truth that relates to everyone, regardless of the presence of health challenges, physical or emotional. 

I really felt early into my second cancer experience that a large part of the reason I faced a relapse was my failure to learn the lesson of balance. Balancing work and play, pushing and resting, ambition and acceptance.

Balance is a funny concept as its subjectivity makes it virtually useless as a goal unless well defined. Before cancer, balance was finding the path to fit all of my activities into the day, never did it mean choosing my priorities. My priority was always to do them all, especially when it came to my two favourites, sports and socializing.

My relapse brought me the lesson of balance and while the subjectivity of the concept remains, my definition has evolved considerably while I’ve maintained my commitment to it. There are times of failure, but I’m human and am fine with that as long as it’s not perpetuated for extended periods.

My ambition continues to be the greatest test of my commitment to balance, even as Karen and I raise our three awesome kids, who are four and under.

Recently I sent a note to a fellow survivor who I felt may have been in a conflict with ambition. I shared my mom's advice and explained how I had to learn the lesson of balance the hard way. Hearing of Jack Layton's passing this week brought the same train of thought as when I wrote that survivor.

Those of us with great ambition and great health challenges must be aware that our ambition is an amazing force that can be used to create beautiful things. The same ambition can be our most dangerous foe, more dangerous than our fragile health.

Choices would be easier to make it you could see far down the path of each, but of course all we can do is make the best call possible in the present moment. 

When our clock stops, ultimately we are responsible for the choices we make and we will see the results of those choices, in our life, no matter how short or long, and our legacy.

While a long life may be a common ambition it is living, not life, that matters most.

Always…
Live life.  Love life.

Geoff

Top 10 of 2010-11

In a few days, YACC will wrap up 2010-11, our fiscal year-end, and dive head first into 2011-12. With a new business plan and crazy (but awesome) revenue targets, our next year will be our best yet.

For an organization that has been in constant growth in its 11 years of life, having “best years” is normal. Our annual average revenue growth of 36 per cent has supported the development and delivery of life-changing programs for more and more survivors.

A few of my favourite moments from the past year:

10. More than 750 copies of We Get It were distributed across Canada to health professionals and survivors

9. We kicked off Localife, our local social support program for young adults, in Calgary (and will roll it out to other locales this year)

8. We reached our best revenue ever, about $825,000

7. YACC’s office crew grew to 9 full-time superstars, each bringing their own talents to our team

6. NewCap Radio took its major support for the Shave for the Brave from St. John’s to Calgary, Ottawa, Halifax and Red Deer which helped us break the half million mark with the Shave for the first time ($508,000)

5. St. Mary’s school in Labrador blew away every other school to capture the "Bravest School" title with a staggering 49 per cent of students shaving (the previous best was 17 per cent!)

4.  We had more than 122,000 visits to youngadultcancer.ca.

3. We reached another level of engagement from our board of directors, lead by chair Brian Vallis, including a commitment to renew our strategic plan and continue advancing the governance of YACC

2. 93 survivors and supporters came through one of our four- or eight-day face-to-face programs

1.    Confucius said it best, "find a job you love and you will never work another day"

I am living this wisdom, we have an essential purpose, a great vision of the future and an awesome team working to realize it.
 
Life is good, and it’s getting better.

In case you haven’t checked out our 2009-2010 highlights, here’s our annual report.

Always…
Live life.  Love life.
Geoff

Here’s to east meeting west

The further away from my treatment I get, the less I acknowledge, or even remember, so many dates that were so significant once upon a time. Like the day I learned I was in remission for the first time (December 22, 1998), or the day I went to a sperm bank with my Mom to attempt to save some swimmers (February 15, 1999), or the day I woke from my coma after three and a half weeks under (August 23, 1999). 

The further out I get, it seems the major ones stay with me while the others require me to search, as I just had to do to come up with the milestones and corresponding dates.

April 13, 1999 has stayed with me. That day a dozen years ago was the day of my first transplant. A transplant that I debated having—for a month—because I didn’t want to willingly choose a treatment option that would negate my fertility as there was a  99 per cent chance it would.

Ultimately, I decided to have the transplant to increase my chances of survival. One doc said I had a 70 per cent chance to get to five years with the transplant, 20 per cent to get to five without. It might seem like an easy call for some, but as the oldest grandchild on both sides of my family, I loved having little kids around, and certainly envisioned fathering my own branch of the family tree some day. This vision wasn’t something I was acutely aware of until the possibility of realizing it was in jeopardy. 

My vision for a family made the transplant decision excruciating. While I chose the transplant, it came with baggage that burned inside—sterility for seven years.

The burning was subtle during many of those seven years; the absence of a life partner kept it from being top of mind. However when that changed, so did the burning.

Throughout this period of sterility my presence within the health system was consistent for various treatments, tests, and check-ups. I also continued my exploration into the medical “east side.”  To use a line from Shali, a survivor buddy of mine, I always wanted east to meet west. 

Through this exploration I had three specific encounters with different health practitioners on the east side. The issue of my fertility (or lack thereof) arose during these meetings and I explored it with them. As if they had conspired beforehand, they all instantly and identically said, “ohh, that will come back when you heal.”

First of all, the concept of “healing” is one that could use a few extra bucks. Secondly, this message of possibility—of hope—was one I didn’t get anywhere else. Thirdly, less than a year after I joined the gym and truly committed to rebuilding physically, my fertility began its return. Just sayin’!

I don’t do much to celebrate most of these once-upon-a-time major milestones—a tweet and a few minutes to remember the day is about it. As Karen and I prepare for the birth of baby #3 next week (c-section scheduled for Monday), I wanted to thank those three ladies representing the east for also representing possibility, and to again remind everyone that 1 per cent is not 0 per cent.

Here’s to another dozen anniversaries!

Always…
Live life.  Love life.

Geoff

What it means to YACC

Almost three years ago we made the decision to rebrand RealTime Cancer to Young Adult Cancer Canada. It was a natural move for us. It also helped clarify who we are and whom we serve. 

Today we are revealing the next phase of our brand evolution—our new logo. One of the reasons behind the change to Young Adult Cancer Canada was the acronym it created (YACC) and it’s synergy with our core programs. We bring survivors together, on the web and in person to hang out, connect with others who “get it” and “YACC” with one another.

The new positioning of YACC, and our upcoming campaign, will represent the philosophy and delivery of YACC programs and the impact they have on young adults who access them.

Helping young adults make a transition through and beyond their cancer experience is our mandate. This transition is based in what I like to call “realistic optimism.” It is the practice of acknowledging the challenges of cancer and life while working to use those challenges to grow and move forward.

There is a time and place to give cancer the finger, but at YACC it’s not 24-7-365.

Personally while I consider cancer a great blessing, I still struggle with many “side-effects” (not just medical) from my experiences and I’m almost 10 years out from my last treatment. It is cool and essential to express what you feel, and if there are one or many fingers involved we say give ‘er. We also think it’s cool and essential to help young adults move from the finger to the thumb.

We are excited to share this new look with you and encourage you to stay tuned as it permeates through YACC’s communications.

Always…
Live life.  Love life.

Geoff

Imagine choosing to die

My good scare in the fall prompted me to think about the possibility of a relapse and the reality of dying. While I am grateful to have a solidly clean bill of health, I have been thinking of dying lately.

I have been fascinated by death since I was a kid, completely curious about the mystery and mysticism held only by the guarantee that with death comes with living.  Age has brought the conclusion that much of the mystery comes from our own fear driven by the unknown of what comes after death. Granted, much resistance surely originates from leaving loved ones and wanting to finish more of one’s work in this life.

I am a benefactor of our health system’s effectiveness, a system that is almost exclusively focused on prolonging life. Is there a time when we no longer prolong life? Is there a time when we expedite a person’s death? Is there a time when we can reduce suffering and the waiting for an inevitable death, which may or may not be painless? These questions require a lot more discussion in Canada.

I won’t pretend to be well informed on the issue of euthanasia, but as an advocate for patient and individual rights, I know it is an issue that is deserving of more attention.

I’ve confronted the reality of my death on many occasions; it comes with the territory when you’re diagnosed with cancer. My comfort with dying varies. The better I feel, the less comfort I have. It is fair to say these days I have great discomfort with the idea of dying any time before I’m 85.

Regardless of when my day comes, I hope am able to make choices that reduce my suffering and those of my loved ones. 

We’ve got some work to do in this country if that is to happen in my lifetime. And the sooner the better, but in the meantime, I’m not going anywhere for a while.

Always…
Live life. Love life.

Geoff

Good scare

What power could a nagging, dull ache in your hip have? Plenty. And while this power remains, I can pleasantly report it has taken a giant step back into my memory where it occupies a place that is more awareness than fear. This power was so connected to the unknown, and where there was once fear surrounding the unknown, there now resides an awareness of my confidence to deal with said unknown.

My most recent scare gets the label of “good” for highlighting a transition I have made from fear to confident awareness.

The pre-test anxiety has always fluctuated for me. Higher when I’m not taking good care of myself, lower when I am. You may be the same, feeling better, more confident about something when you have actually invested energy in that something. Practice doesn’t just make perfect, it builds confidence. Everyday is your practice for your health.

In the nine plus years since my second transplant, I haven’t had any health concerns “of unknown origin,” until June of last year. The nagging hip pain combined with an irregular but frequent burning in my abdomen changed that. It prompted investigation: lots of blood work, MRI and some specialist appointments. That investigation, while fortunately revealing the desired “nothing” about my physical health, proved that my emotional health is solid and ready for any health challenge—though that is not an invitation for one!

The process of having serious investigation was a reminder of how far I’ve come and how quickly things can change. It also brought the gift of knowing how I would react, but more importantly how I’d feel, should I have to face a return to my hockey game with cancer.

The feeling I had the night before getting my results remains within me today. A feeling of confidence, not necessarily in my health, but in my ability to restore it should the need arise. This confidence faded, disappeared largely, for a long time after my relapse in 2001. I have worked on this restoration but not until this recent, and most significant test did I know where I stood.

It was a good scare for me to get at an important stage of my life. As I mentioned, cancer in many ways was easier for me when I was single. Being a dad puts any potential cancer challenges on a whole new level compared to my previous ones as a single guy in his early twenties. I was never quite sure how I’d react if I had to deal with cancer again I now know that my confidence to deal with whatever lies ahead of me and my family is sky high.

I take a lot of credit for that as I’ve made a big-time effort to get stronger, enhance my health and take care of all of me. I take “practice” seriously. A special thank you to my good scare for shedding light on my confidence.

Always…
Live life.  Love life.

Geoff

Read "My hockey stick is handy but not yet needed," the post leading up to this one.

My hockey stick is handy but not yet needed

Most days it is dull, aching but never overpowering, until Monday ironically.  This ache in my lower back, my left hip, where I’ve had many a needle sent in to retrieve bone marrow, this is the host of my pain that has prompted my return to the healthcare system “for further investigation.”

Truth, I have never left, but for nine years it has really been on my terms. Blood tests, phlebotomies to help reduce my ferritin, check-ups, they have been primarily driven by me but a few weeks ago it changed.

A simple phone call from my GP’s office… “the doctor would like to talk with you about your blood work.” I’ve had literally thousands of conversations about my blood work with doctors, but I haven’t had a call from one to request a discussion in almost nine years.

The dull ache in my lower back started in June and it hasn’t gone away. It hasn’t slowed me down; I throw my girls in the air like I always have, tackle my squats at the gym and stretch the same, but the ache is always there. Slight rises in intensity were normal until Monday when the pain rose sharply for that day only.

Tonight I had my first CAT scan in a decade. Tomorrow, hopefully, I’ll get the results. Worst case it will be on Friday when I see my GP to also get my latest blood results back. Perhaps it’s maturity, perhaps it’s experience but I’m ok with this little bit of waiting, for now.

When I was a “one-time” cancer survivor my fear of relapse was next to non-existent. The moment treatment finished from my second diagnosis and I became a “two-time” cancer survivor the thought of relapse has occupied a consistent presence in my mind. It rarely dominates the way it once did and I regularly go weeks without the thought of a third diagnosis. I’m not sure I’ve ever gone months.

As the years have gone by my confidence in my health has grown. The moment I got that call to come in and review my blood work I felt the fear that I know so well. It is a fear with a blessed twist attached, I first experienced it just over four years ago, when Adia was born. For me, being a two-time cancer survivor was easier before I was a dad. The greatest blessings in my life are also connected to one of my greatest fears.

Life is funny like that.

While my fear set in immediately, and I let it be, it didn’t last long. I remember a very substantial shift in my thinking later that evening, and it grew the next day on my way to see my doc. It went to a familiar place, the same place it was 12 years ago at this time. A place full of fight and confidence in my ability to deal with whatever lies ahead.

I’m not breaking out my hockey stick just yet, but it is handy should the need arise. Despite my back pain, and the nagging ache in my abdomen that accompanies it regularly, I feel the best I’ve felt in nine years. Thanks to my very responsive hematologist we are investigating aggressively, of course being a cancer survivor puts you at an increased risk of getting cancer.

Whatever the results of our aggressive screening activity I am better armed than ever to step on the ice with cancer. As a veteran I know how the game is played, my supports are better than ever and my motivation for winning is at an all time high.

Here’s to hoping I stay off this ice for now and always.

Always...
Live life.  Love life.
Geoff

Read "Good scare," the follow up to this post.