Making Predictions on Cancer

Making predictions on how cancer will affect your life from diagnosis to post treatment is a waste of time. No one knows what tomorrow will bring.

BY DANA STEWART

PUBLISHED NOVEMBER 12, 2018

Dana Stewart was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2010 at the age of 32. She is the co-founder of a cancer survivorship organization called The Dragonfly Angel Society. She volunteers as an advocate and mentor, focusing on young adults surviving cancer. She enjoys writing about life as a cancer survivor, as well as connecting survivors to the resources, inspirations and stories that have helped her continue to live her best life, available at www.dragonflyangelsociety.com.

I am a planner. I've been planning out everything from outfits I'd be wearing the next day to where I want to live in five years. I love calendars and daily planners where I can write down everything and see exactly what is happening in my life. So, of course I was shocked with a cancer diagnosis. Let's see, I don't see that action point planned out in my diary for July 10, 2010. “There goes my whole life plan,” I thought. And, in some ways, it definitely did get thrown out the window. However, as with the way life works, new plans arose, and I continue on with my life. It's taken years of living in the post-cancer-diagnosis world for me to get to this line of thinking. I learned the hard way that you just can't constantly make predictions and/or plan everything out. You will miss your entire life if you do that.

What kind of predictions did I make on cancer? Well, tons and tons. I was so blindsided by a diagnosis of breast cancer when I was 32 years old and wanted to be sure that rug was never pulled from under me again. So, I took my planning and predicting to a whole new level. I wanted immediate answers to the following questions:

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