#TUEmpower by @helenlouisa
My name’s Helen. I’m 27 years old, an ISFJ, a lover of all things bread, a to-do list freak and a proud cancer survivor.
December 2016 – Life was going smoothly when I discovered that I had a huge 20cm mass growing inside me. During this time, I was constantly feeling bloated and experienced rapid weight gain. This was unusual to me because I ate relatively healthy and worked out several times a week.
After many visits to the doctors, I was told that I needed surgery in order to take out this mass. A biopsy was done and I was diagnosed with Stage 3 Ovarian Cancer. I was so ignorant of my symptoms at the time that I had let it get this far. And so, I went through cycles of chemotherapy over a period of 3 months.
Though I am one of the lucky ones—with hundreds of different types of cancers out there, mine had a 95% survival rate—it didn’t make me feel any less devastated when I found out I had cancer. I was constantly asking myself, why does this have to happen to me? What have I done wrong in life to get to this point? I felt a lot of self-doubt in myself because I felt like I was a completely different person.
2017 - Helen after being diagnosed with Stage 3 Ovarian Cancer.
The biggest challenge of all this was losing my identity.
Cancer treatment does more than just make you lose your hair or change your body. Although this was certainly one of the biggest challenges. Even before cancer, I’ve always had some sort of body-image, self-confidence issue. This just made it 10x times worse.
I was scared of people seeing a different side of me; a weak, pale and bald me.
There was also the emotional side to it. You become more vulnerable and so I started to close myself up from the rest of the world. It took me a very, very long time before I could socialize again.
During those times, I prayed a lot to keep me going, every single day. Chemo made my body so weak, I spent the majority of my time in bed. Having family and friends around helped so much; in times like this, we are only as strong as our support system. My family gave me the most amazing support throughout my whole journey—from the countless doctor appointments, tests and hospital stays to the flights they took so we could all be together. And friends who sent me words of encouragements, visits, prayers, flowers and my favourite donuts.
At this point, my family and I were closer than ever before. However, there was a period of time where my partner and I grew apart, as this was very new to the both of us and we didn’t exactly know how to handle it. But over time we got better and better at it.
When love is real, it comes back to you no matter what.
From this experience, I have learned not to ever take your health for granted. If you feel like something is not right with your body, make sure to get it checked straightaway. I could have saved myself from surgery and chemo if I wasn’t so ignorant and had discovered it earlier.
And if there’s one thing I’d like for people to take away from my story is that, even though life may not always seem so perfect, or maybe you’re going through a hard time right now, always keep pushing forward with a positive attitude. Cancer has taught me one of the most valuable lessons in life. A lesson of self-love.
For many years, I’ve always had this image inside my head of the ‘ideal woman’ that many of us aspire to be.
But cancer taught me that all of those things aren’t as important as the body that survives. I felt more gratitude towards my body for being strong, resilient and for fighting through this battle.
And while it’s been a crazy rollercoaster ride for me, look at where I am now; I got my beautiful long hair back, I feel more confident in myself and I am getting married to the love of my life next year! So never lose hope, as it is the only thing stronger than fear that could lead you to the day you’ve been waiting for.
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@helenlouisa’s story is an exclusive blog post by Things Untouched.