topic young survivors in Living with and beyond cancer

young survivors

Nikki_YAC — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 01:21:11 GMT

hi everyone, i am a young adult survivor of cancer. i was diagnosed in 2002 at age 28 years. i am now 35. i would love to meet any other young adults who have been diagosed with cancer and chat about things that matter the most to us young ones...

young survivors

admin_one — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 01:22:11 GMT

Hi Nikki, Welcome to cancer support online. My Name is Raul and I am the new Online Community Coordinator. Would you like to tell us a little bit mroe abotu youy experience? Look forward to hearing from you, Rul

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Wed, 11 Mar 2009 01:23:00 GMT

Please note: This post has been removed as it breaches the Terms & Conditions of the website. Kind regards, The Administration team

Re: young survivors

artist_in_recov — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 06:04:40 GMT

Hi, I am pretty new here - I was diagnosed with Leukaemia at the age of 23 and now have just passed three years in remission! I had a lot of complications with my treatment including a nasty infection that I have already mentioned elsewhere on this site so I won't go into it again. I am interested in speaking to people who have also experienced a difficult time post-end of treatment, and a few years on. I am finding it more emotionally challenging now, three years on, than I did at the time. I thought it would have been getting easier by now.

Re: young survivors

LozzaK — Tue, 12 May 2009 03:22:55 GMT

Hi everyone, I'm Lauren 🙂 Was diagnosed at 22 with tongue cancer, and am 3 and a half years in remission. It's so great to have an outlet like this for YACs in Australia, I've been on the Planet Cancer site for a couple of years but it's good that we have something of our own now. I'm passionate about advocating for adolescents and young adults with cancer so hopefully this is just the beginning of better services and treatment for those of us stuck between paediatrics and geriatrics!! Hope everyone is well, look forward to speaking with you all soon! Loz 🙂

Re: young survivors

admin_one — Tue, 12 May 2009 03:26:50 GMT

Welcome to cancer connections Lauren. If you have any questions or ideas about how to make this site better do not hesitate to drop me a line at any time. Talk to you soon.

Re: young survivors

artist_in_recov — Tue, 12 May 2009 03:38:35 GMT

Hi Loz, Great to 'meet' you and hope to chat more with you. I totally feel the 'stuck in between' thing, YAC's are a very unique bunch and I feel as though there needs to be more outlets for us, like this one, which is perfect.

Re: young survivors

Nikki_YAC — Wed, 20 May 2009 08:43:04 GMT

Hi Loz! glad to see you here now, it is good that Australia has a place we can all meet and hang out now :) how exciting! would love to hear what things have you been involved in with your advocacy work? nikki

Re: young survivors

Nikki_YAC — Wed, 20 May 2009 08:46:29 GMT

Hi Caitlin, how is the study going for you? have you got enough responses? what is your area of research e.g. are you a post grad psychology student? how did you come about doing this study? nikki

Re: young survivors

Nikki_YAC — Wed, 20 May 2009 08:49:12 GMT

was Dx in 2002, at age 28 years, with acute lymphoblastic leukaemia and somehow managed to come out the other end (quite damaged) to slowly and progressively to get on with life again. Therefore I regard myself as one hell of a LUCKY GIRL. Since my cancer Dx I have managed to finish a university degree in Health Promotion (Honours) in order to get myself involved with Young Adult and Cancer (YAC) issues and support service development (as I noticed there has never really been much help for us YACs over the age of 25 years!). The Cancer Council NSW have been instrumental in supporting my myriad of ideas for new support services for YACs (thank god someone finally listened to all my whinging) and their advocacy training program has equipped me with skills, strength and connection with other like minded individuals who want to instrument change for the better. I hope to meet MANY more YACs through this online support service, so jot down a line and say hi 🙂

Re: young survivors

slacker — Wed, 20 May 2009 13:00:36 GMT

This is the first time I've been back to this website since last year, and I'm happy to see it's improved! I'm a young adult survivor of pancreatic cancer (diagnosed january'08 at 30, 32 now...still qualify as young, right? ;-)) - it's so nice to see a forum like this. e

Re: young survivors

Nikki_YAC — Wed, 20 May 2009 23:18:12 GMT

hey your younger than me! :0

Re: young survivors

stevec — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 13:28:28 GMT

Hey Nikki, We've met on other websites, but its good to see you again! I was diagnosed in 2007 with testicular cancer and my wife was diagnosed in 2005 with thyroid. We met in 1999 and we're not sure why we got so lucky with this disease... Anyway, we're both over 1 year in remission now and doing well and have just had our 2nd child. Interestingly, we've only just discovered how much support and activity is out here on the interwebs for people like us, so we're kinda new to all this. I think we've both been in denial about it until recently. Anyway, thanks to everyone for putting themselves out there and I hope to speak to you all soon. Steve

Re: young survivors

Nikki_YAC — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 01:36:52 GMT

Hi Steve, Its great to touch base with you again too ;) It is quite unique that both you and your wife have recently gone through cancer as young adults. CONGRATS on the birth of your second child, what a HUGE accomplishment that is after all you both have been through. yay! I see you have joined the new YOUNG ADULTS SOCIAL GROUP - welcome! I hope this group and this site bring both you and your wife much needed connections that can help make the integration of cancer into your lives a little easier. I know for me.... that doing all this work around setting up services for YACs has helped me find a way to include cancer in my life, rather than trying to push it aside and pretend it did not happen...cancer has been an absolute life changing event through both the good and difficult times... 🙂

Re: young survivors

jules_jp — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 02:06:35 GMT

Hi there everyone, I often joke about it with others who I have met on this journey that its weird to be part of a club (that I didn't really want to be a part of???). I have been sick with chest infection and couldn't join in on the chat and advocacy. I have now returned to "lurking" on some sites. Here are some links here about YAC sites: http://i2y.com/ http://www.nowwhat.org.au/Home.aspx

Re: young survivors

Nikki_YAC — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 04:53:53 GMT

hey misti, welcome back. chest infections totally suck...all those friggin chest xrays you have to do for them suck too! hope you are well on the way to recovery :) thanks for the links... i2y is great and CanTeen are doing a fab job with the 'now what?' site by helping the offspring and siblings of AYA with cancer. i will post up a heap of links either on the YACs home page or in the new YA social Group in the not so distant future (probably will do both) The sexuality live chat event was a hoot, it went really well. The advocacy training that is on this weekend.... don't worry there should be more of these to come, or you can still contact Rory at the CC and sign up for one of the more frequent advocacy trainings in your local area that is open to all ages. you will still learn bucket loads and you can come join our advocacy network - scheduled to form in the second half of this year. Rory's contact details are: Rory Alcock | Advocacy Development and Networks Officer Cancer Council > NSW | 153 Dowling St, Woolloomooloo NSW 2011 > T: 02 9334 1859 | F: 02 8302 3530 | E: rorya@nswcc.org.au great to see that you have joined the new YA Group BTW 🙂 we should have loads of fun with it! Nikki

Re: young survivors

Kate_Unicorn — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 05:55:15 GMT

Hi All, I'm excited to be starting off with a new Younger Adults Survivors group on this site next week, and wanted people to know that we still have one or two places left if anyone is interested in joining us! This is a private group, which will be running over 6 weeks with weekly live chat sessons (these will be on Tuesday evenings) If you're interested, please let me know - I do need to talk to people over the phone before placing them in a group, so send me a private message and I'll be in touch! Cheers, Kate

Re: young survivors

Vetticus — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 06:23:42 GMT

Hi all survivors! I'm actually nowhere near the "survivor stage"- am a newbie, just got diagnosed with a dodgey brain tumour 3 months ago. I'm 32 and a tad twitchy about it all although some days are actually surprisingly ok (and then there are the rotten ones). But it's nice to see there are beaming survivors like you guys out there! (yay) I guess what I was wondering is would anyone care to share with me what emotional and life-planning tools they used to get them through the limbo stage after diagnosis, initial treatments (I've had a craniotomy and radio) and then the big waiting game...?? Any hints and wisdom appreciated! Yvette

Re: young survivors

stevec — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 06:43:51 GMT

Hey Yvette, Sorry to hear about your dodgy tumor. The one thing everyone told me when I was in the limbo stage is that it gets easier (no matter what happens) and it has for me. I'm actually a long way off being a 'survivor' too (I've got another 5.5 years of remission to go - apparently I have to make it to 7 years instead of the usual 5) but I wasn't going to choose 'I have cancer' because I don't believe thats true anymore. Anyway, the waiting is always the worst part of it. I've found the best way to deal with it is to get out there and talk about it. Get referred to a psycologist through your GP or oncologist, oncology patients can get it free through medicare where I live, or talk to people like us online. I think the worst thing to do it to pretend you're 'over it' and act like nothing has happened. Cheers Steve

Re: young survivors

AmandaC — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 00:18:52 GMT

Hi Yvette, Sorry to hear about your tumour, its early days for you and its normal to feel a little frazzled and uncertain. I focused on planning for the future…almost compulsively actually…not so good! I decided I wanted to go to uni, have more kids, buy a house, go on holidays and the list just kept me thinking further and further ahead which for me was like saying to myself I was going to live for a long time. But what Steve says is true the best way is to seek solice in places like this and see your GP to get referred to a psychologist that can help you work through your thoughts. Waiting is always the hardest.