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	<title>WIRL Project &#187; Cancer</title>
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	<description>What It&#039;s Really Like.</description>
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		<title>F: Faith &#8211; What It&#8217;s Really Like</title>
		<link>http://www.wirlproject.com/f-faith-what-its-really-like/</link>
		<comments>http://www.wirlproject.com/f-faith-what-its-really-like/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 27 Jul 2015 14:00:01 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Brody]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Family]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Health/Fitness]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Life/Leisure]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Love/Relationships]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[ABCs]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Belief]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Brother]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Cancer]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Differences]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Faith]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Faith is Funny]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Inward]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Mother]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Outward]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Personal Faith]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Prayer]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Siblings]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.wirlproject.com/?p=7895</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[This post is part of a series titled, “A-B-Cs – What It’s Really Like”. Each week a new letter and its word will be revealed. Each word’s explanation will illustrate significant personal meaning, application and ultimately demonstrate, What It’s Really Like…  Faith is funny. It is presumed that all of us believe in something bigger than ourselves. Peace, love, religion, science, etc. Harmony for all humans, love will prevail/conquer all, trust in the power of the supernatural or higher being, or simply having faith that the sun will come up tomorrow. Out of all the words that I have chosen for this project Faith may be the most difficult to “own”. Maybe it is because I am still learning how to take ownership of it. It has been nearly one month since my mother was diagnosed with Stage-4 Lymphatic cancer. Unofficially to date, this will be her third major encounter with the disease. I learned of the diagnosis late on a Friday night. She would immediately begin an intensive 6-month round of chemotherapy the following Tuesday. Our family’s world, just as in 2005, would be rocked again. In the fall of 2005 my parents would reveal to my brother and I that my mother had been diagnosed with breast cancer. The announcement came only a short time before she would undergo a major surgical procedure to help combat her condition. Fortunately my brother and I were attending the same college just 35 miles from our home. We would be there to do whatever possible to ensure the health and healing for our mother during this time. Either out of frustration or fear both of us became angry with my parents after the initial numbness of the announcement subsided. Why did they wait so long to tell us? What good could have come out of holding this news close to the vest? Why were we not included in the updates while the testing process was playing out? We wanted to know why we were being protected like children and not treated as the adults we were. As the elder brother, I became the spokesperson to vent our grievances toward my parents for not disclosing this news beforehand and the virtual blindside of the situation. My father calmly explained that they wanted to be absolutely sure before letting us know (a wise order of operations that I would not understand until many years later with all of the tests and close calls we have endured over the last decade). At the time I felt the explanation was unacceptable and I made both of my parents to swear that they would never withhold any critical information from us again. I finished my proclamation by scolding my mother pleading, “Why wouldn’t you tell us? Don’t you think people may want to pray for you?” Faith is something that I keep very personal. I recall asking my mom when I was a teenager why we discontinued attending church. She said that our involvement in sports and other activities during the week (often on Sundays) made it difficult to stay on top of tasks around the house and attend church regularly. While she acknowledged that it was a poor excuse, our regular attendance would dwindle to part-time to eventually not at all. I also asked her if our absenteeism bothered her. She told me something that I will never forget. She said that even though it bothered her that we no longer attended church, it did not change her relationship with God. “Everyone is different.  Everyone has a different measure of faith.  As long as you have a chat with him (God) once in a while and know that he is always there, I think that is what matters most.” At closer look, much of my faith is deeply internalized likely due to this lesson from my mother. Many readers may have already clicked to another page because they assumed I would continue plugging religion, making for an uncomfortable read. I understand and I am no different. I get extremely uncomfortable when I see continuous expression from individuals on subjects of politics or religion. I believe you are entitled to your opinion, but prefer you keep most of it to yourself. I internalize most of my opinions on these subjects out of respect for others. So much so that it wasn’t until over the course of the past year that I have become comfortable praying in front of my wife. Faith is one element that I have never allowed to become outward and public. Fast forward to 2015 less than 24 hours after learning my mother’s diagnosis… During a break from yard work I began a rare, aimless flip through Facebook to discover that a well-connected colleague of my brother’s had announced my mother’s diagnosis and asked for prayers via a status update. While I appreciated the sentiment of the announcement, I quickly began to boil over in anger. I waited about a 30 minutes before shooting off a text message to my brother, hoping that he would acknowledge what I believed to be a mistake. My thoughts: To this point, I have not heard directly from my parents. My brother filled me in on the diagnosis the night before. Surely they had not notified the family yet. How awful would it be for a family member to learn of my mother’s condition via Facebook? I explained in the text to my brother that while I appreciated the gesture, I did not think the timing was appropriate. In the 15 minutes I waited for a response I convinced myself that my brother would apologize for the mistake and call my mother right away to set it straight. What I would receive in a reply was completely the opposite. For nearly an hour my brother and I went back and forth via text messages about our positions regarding this serious announcement. I claimed that it was a private issue that should be shared with the family and that mom could decide whether or not the information should be shared with the public. My brother countered with chastising me for not giving more credit toward those who were trying to call on faith and the power of prayer to help lift up my mother during this time. We stopped the exchange after we discovered that we were at a complete impasse. During our conversation I challenged my brother to reach out to our mom to guarantee that it was appropriate for this information to be made public without her approval. Once again, I was shocked find what followed. At just a few minutes before midnight, 24 hours after I learned of the diagnosis, an email hit my inbox just as I was getting into bed. It was from my mother to the rest of my immediate family. In the email she apologized for the relay of information and explained why she authorized it to be delivered this way. She cited a moment back in 2005 recalling when her young son Brody said, “Don&#8217;t you think people may want to pray for you?!” I nearly dropped my phone when I read the sentence. Up until that point I did not recall saying those words. The same action I had demanded in the past had been granted to me and I did not like the results. Almost instantaneously I realized that it was not my call and I was in the wrong. This was about her. She went on to parallel some of my brother’s statements from our text message fight: a prayer army is better than a prayer group. I have not publicly shared about my mother’s condition until now. My brother and others have shared her situation with others on social media asking for prayers of hope, strength and faith. After thousands of likes and hundreds of comments I am beginning to realize that this is something I can’t take on in my own small group. Faith is funny. It can be inward or outward. I prefer to be inward. Together it can be extremely powerful. You may ask &#8211; if you are so inward, why are you sharing all of this personal information? The answer is that I am still learning to own my faith beyond something bigger than myself. WORRY STOPS WHERE FAITH BEGINS. – GMa’s Journal &#160;]]></description>
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		<title>This I Believe</title>
		<link>http://www.wirlproject.com/this-i-believe/</link>
		<comments>http://www.wirlproject.com/this-i-believe/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 25 Jun 2015 18:00:57 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Kassidy Everard]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Entertainment]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Family]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Believe]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Cancer]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[cry]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Death]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Die]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Life]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Sad]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Words]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.wirlproject.com/?p=7188</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[&#8220;I believe that taking your last breath does not mean you are dead. I believe that you die twice; once when you take your last breath, and again when someone whispers your name for the last time.&#8221; &#8211; Banksy When I was 9 years old, my aunt died of cancer. I remember getting the call from my father telling me that she had passed in the night with him by her side. He watched her pass, he watched her take her last breath, and he heard her last words. &#8220;She was turning purple, getting pale in the face, she was dying,&#8221; My dad said. My father had lost his sister that day and I had lost an amazing aunt. I remember visiting her like it was yesterday. She loved to talk. She loved her husband, and she loved her kids. But two years after she died, her husband got cancer. My uncle went blind, he got sicker and sicker. He left a granddaughter behind, two daughters, and three sons. But Aunt Tina did not know. She did not know that her husband would soon be gone, too. Through her chemotherapy there were times when she wished she would die. Her hair was all gone, she lost more than half her original body weight, her cheeks were so sunken in to her face that it looked like she hadn&#8217;t eaten for weeks, and she could hardly walk. Recognizing people close to her even became a struggle. Sadly, sometimes I wished she would go, just so she wouldn&#8217;t feel the pain anymore. Even though it had been a year since I had seen her last, I knew she couldn&#8217;t have looked any better. I knew she was worse, and that the pain was killing her more than the cancer was. I wanted her better, but I knew she wouldn&#8217;t be. After all, it would have been selfish of me to force her through more treatment. I did not go to her funeral. I did not see her die. I wasn&#8217;t allowed to go. My father told me that I wouldn&#8217;t have wanted to go, that I wouldn&#8217;t have wanted to see a dead person. Instead I cried, like anyone would with such a loss. I was nine, and even though I was still a child, I understood. I knew where she had gone. She is where we all end up some day. Maybe that place is called heaven, maybe it isn&#8217;t. But she is in a better place now, where all the pain is gone. She is where we all end up someday. She is also in my heart. She is where she belongs; everywhere and nowhere at once. Aunt Tina is not dead. Uncle Tink is not dead. They are both soft whispers in the mouths of many. Their names have not been said for the last time. They are not dead. This I believe. This I will always believe.]]></description>
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		</item>
		<item>
		<title>When All Eyes Are On You and Your Story</title>
		<link>http://www.wirlproject.com/when-all-eyes-are-on-you-and-your-story/</link>
		<comments>http://www.wirlproject.com/when-all-eyes-are-on-you-and-your-story/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 17 Jun 2015 13:00:25 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[Guest WIRL]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Family]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Life/Leisure]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Technology/Web]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[WIRL Challenge]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Award]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[BlogU]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Brain Cancer]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Bring Back The Sunshine]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Cancer]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Hell]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Huffington Post]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Impossible]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Sorrow]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Survive]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[WIRL Challenge BlogU]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.wirlproject.com/?p=7023</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[I spent the majority of last week far from home &#8211; in the exotic land of Baltimore, at BlogU&#8217;15. It was a remarkable trip- I met dozens of new friends, caught up with even more old friends, learned, laughed, danced my ass off, and was beyond honored to be chosen by the Huffington Post for the Term Paper of the Year - an award to recognize the best of blogging over the past year. This award is something I almost didn&#8217;t accept, though. You see, the post I wrote, the one that Huffington Post named the best creative writing in a blog post for a whole calendar year, is something I can&#8217;t even describe without crying. I wrote it after Christmas, when we were in a sort of limbo with M&#8217;s cancer, and I was contemplating the idea that my husband might not live to see another Christmas. At the time it was something I could write, because we didn&#8217;t know anything at all. We didn&#8217;t know when it was going to happen, or if it was going to happen, or especially when it was going to happen, but I couldn&#8217;t begin to write something like that now. Because four months after I published that post, it did. My husband&#8217;s cancer was back, and I was thrown headlong into the chaos of scheduling surgeries and orchestrating chemotherapies. &#8220;Spinning the roulette wheel,&#8221; I believe I called it in that post. For about two and a half months, now, I&#8217;ve been living in the overwhelming uncertainty of brain cancer Hell. In a lot of ways, it&#8217;s not so bad. In a lot of ways, it&#8217;s very matter-of-fact and straightforward. Organize pills into the six or so segments in which they must be taken. Coordinate with physical and vocational and occupational and cognitive therapists for &#8220;return to work&#8221; plans and orthopedic testing. Write down everything. EVERYTHING. It&#8217;s not hard. It&#8217;s impossible. But I haven&#8217;t been able to even think about things like that post. Because you can&#8217;t function if you think about things like that. So I stood up in front of a crowd of amazing bloggers and human beings in general, and I read everything I haven&#8217;t been willing to say to myself, even in the quietest, vaguest of terms. And I cried. I knew I would cry the moment Emma Mustich said my name. She looked over at me, and I felt that heaviness in my chest. Not dread, exactly. Not public speaking nerves. Something else. I broke all the rules of good public speaking the moment I stepped behind the podium, looked at the screen set before me with my words waiting, and sighed. A heavy, loaded sigh. And then I began to read. And I cried. There were already paper napkins set next to the microphone for me. I didn&#8217;t miss a beat. I just cried, and wished all over again, with all my heart, that I could bring the sunshine back. If only for another minute. If only for a heartbeat. I wished I could spin the world round and never have written this awful thing, this beautiful and terrible thing, that I was standing watching somebody else bare a soul scarred by their own demons. That I could be drinking too many glasses of wine and cramming my face with pastries and not have a spotlight I&#8217;d asked for shone on my sorrows. When I finished reading, everyone clapped. People handed me gift bags and hugged me, and I stumbled off the stage, into the arms of The Domestic Pirate. She hugged me as though we were the oldest and dearest of friends, and I broke. For a minute I stood in a darkened auditorium and wept into the shoulders of somebody I&#8217;d met in person for the first time that day. There haven&#8217;t been words invented yet to describe the sort of gratitude one feels for friends like that, unequivocal, genuine, and present. The rest of the weekend passed in a manic high. I learned, I laughed, I got drunk and danced until I was pretty sure I tore something. Kind of like I know I said I sometimes do in that same piece. People were so gracious. They were so kind. They said the nicest, most flattering things, and I blushed and tried to accept their compliments without feeling fraudulent. And then I came home, and crashed. What I should have learned years ago was that you can&#8217;t do this to yourself. You can&#8217;t not feel, and then feel, and then not feel things you don&#8217;t want to. The emotional energy invested in not feeling something is outrageous. I spent five years expending that energy, through M&#8217;s original diagnosis, through chemo and radiation and experimental arsenic IVs. Through a wedding and two pregnancies, through unemployment and both of our return to school. Through so much doubt, and so much uncertainty. And the minute I could lift the curtain on all that repressed anxiety, it crippled me. It nearly killed me. I believe we&#8217;ve survived M&#8217;s cancer so long because of this optimism, this blindness to the alternatives, but maybe it&#8217;s not the only way. Part of me is certain that unless I pull that curtain closed, really shut out the doubts and fears, they will manifest themselves. The way that until I wrote about worrying that my husband&#8217;s cancer would come back, it hadn&#8217;t come back. That my comfort with my grief precipitated the new need for surgery by four measly months. Like I did this to him. Like this is my fault, for publicly doubting, even for a second. Like if only I&#8217;d never let that doubt out at all, we would still be living as though we were done with brain cancer forever. And that&#8217;s what hurts the most. Knowing that, no matter how wrong it is, or how self abusive it is, no matter what&#8230; if things go badly, it will be my fault. Because I&#8217;m the one who wasn&#8217;t strong enough to keep shutting out those doubts. No matter what, I will never be as purely certain of the future as I was eight years ago. Maybe the cynicism of age, or the experience, or the realism, or whatever you call it, is inevitable. But that also implies that death is inevitable. And yeah, it is, but I don&#8217;t want it to be now. Not now. Not when I could have done something. Could have been better. Could have been stronger. Could have been more. I want to say I know we&#8217;ll survive, but I don&#8217;t even know what that means right now. All I know is I want to wake up in the morning with my husband&#8217;s cheek resting on my ear, with his stomach pressed into my back, and I want to stay there forever. Until the sun sets and rises and sets again, and we&#8217;re the only things left in an entire universe of passing time. I want to feel warm, and safe, and loved, and to believe that each day is going to be no different from the last. I want to stop waiting. &#160; Join The Conversation! Easily contribute your story here. &#160; About the Author… Lea Grover is a writer and speaker living on Chicago&#8217;s south side. Her writing has been featured in numerous anthologies, including &#8220;Listen To Your Mother: What She Said Then, What We&#8217;re Saying Now,&#8221; and on websites ranging from The Huffington Post to AlterNet to The Daily Mail Online, and she speaks about sex positivity in parenting and on behalf of the RAINN Speakers Bureau. She can be found on her blog (Becoming SuperMommy), on Twitter (@bcmgsupermommy), and Facebook, or preparing her upcoming memoir. &#160; &#160;]]></description>
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		<title>What It&#8217;s Really Like To Go Through Chemo Therapy</title>
		<link>http://www.wirlproject.com/what-its-really-like-to-go-through-chemo-therapy/</link>
		<comments>http://www.wirlproject.com/what-its-really-like-to-go-through-chemo-therapy/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 12 May 2015 16:00:00 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator><![CDATA[WIRL Project]]></dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Health/Fitness]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Life/Leisure]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Battle]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Cancer]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Cancer Treatment]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Chemo]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Chemo Therapy]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Diagnosis]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Fight]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Treatment]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[What It's Really Like]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[WIRL]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.wirlproject.com/?p=6088</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Finding out you have cancer would bring a whirlwind of thoughts, feelings, and emotions to your mind and body. Then, the reality sets in and you&#8217;re faced with the treatment options. How are you going to beat this beast? The emotional and physical strength it must take to get through such a thing must be incredible. WIRL Project wants to shed light on this subject because there are so many stories. Stories of hope, strength, and fear. Educational stories, I&#8217;ve-been-there-too stories, painful stories, stories of loss, and stories of hope. Unfortunately, we ALL know someone who&#8217;s been diagnosed with cancer; it&#8217;s hard for everyone. We mainly hear about the sad stories, but so many people find strength and put up an amazing fight. They show us courage, hope, faith, and triumph as they rise above the awful disease. And we&#8217;re not just talking about the patients. Sometimes, being the caregiver of a cancer patient can be just as daunting on the mind and soul, especially because they are asked to be so strong all the time. WIRL Project is asking you to contribute stories and confessions about cancer and what it was really like. We want to hear from caregivers, patients, doctors, therapists, friends, etc. and how cancer has affected or changed your life. To easily share as a guest, click here. Today, we are sharing a story of what it&#8217;s really like to go through chemotherapy. Actress, Krysta Rodriguez, just finished several months of treatment and was willing to let us in and share what it was really like. Here is an excerpt from the story: &#8220;&#8230;but by the time I walked into the treatment center for my first round, my resolve had reach Hulk-like proportions. I practically kicked down the door chanting, &#8220;What do we want? Chemo! When do we want it? NOW!&#8221; My body needed me to step up and I had to answer the call. If that meant going through a little slice of hell, then so be it. That assuredness lessened as the treatments went on. Once you&#8217;ve experienced the side effects, it&#8217;s hard to psyche yourself into returning to the scene of the crime. I would find myself getting sad or anxious in the days leading up to another dose. I think my body just knew what was in store and wasn&#8217;t ready. But for me, mental strength was key, and I would allow these moments to happen but not dwell on them.&#8221; Click the link below to read the whole story from Cosmopolitan.com and share YOUR story at WIRL Project today. You never know how sharing your experience could impact someone else&#8217;s life. *Image and excerpt from Cosmopolitan.com &#160;]]></description>
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