Hope and Lung Cancer

When I was diagnosed with lung cancer, I really didn’t understand the true meaning of hope. Yes, we hear others saying, “There is hope, or be hopeful,” but honestly, many don’t apply that to their lives until it needs to.

I remember when I was diagnosed over 9 years ago and was given 18 months to live; I honestly had no hope. This was when I started to understand the meaning of “hope.” I asked myself, “Is there really hope,” I can now say absolutely!

Having hope when newly diagnosed

When I tell newly diagnosed lung cancer patients that I’ve been living with lung cancer for 9 years now, they tell me, “I want to be like you.” I tell them you can and remember there is hope.

Many become hopeless when they are told, “You have lung cancer.” I know because I was one of those patients. But I looked forward to hope and I started with my children.

When I was diagnosed, I had my youngest in middle school, two in high school, and 2 in college. It was extremely rough on them, but I made it a mission to focus on them and give lung cancer one hell of a fight, and that is what gave me hope!

I also set goals and found that setting goals gave me hope. It gave me something to look forward to. Besides fighting to be around for my children and see them grow, one of my biggest goals was to travel more.

Going on the trip of a lifetime

In 2015, I planned a family vacation to Costa Rica; I told my husband about one last family trip before I went. While waiting patiently for that trip, I continued to stay positive and hold on to hope.

The trip came and went, and we had a wonderful time in Costa Rica. I wanted to give my kids a memorable trip. That was at the end of July of 2015.

Coming back from that trip, I felt revived and knew there was hope for me. My mother-in-law surprised me with another trip. She came and gave me a receipt; I asked her what this was, and she said we were going to Israel. She had paid for me to go with her and her church to Israel.

We left at the end of October 2015. She told me you’ll get your healing over there. I was not religious at all, so I went with it.

Getting ready for that trip and doing my research about Israel and the Middle East with excitement helped me to forget, even if it was for a second, that I have lung cancer.

That trip was memorable and beautiful, and I thank my mother-in-law for taking me. In December 2015, I was told the spot that had progressed to my liver was gone, and I was good, basically NED (no evidence of disease).

Finding hope in life everyday

Do I credit hope and those trips I took? Absolutely! It not only gave me hope, but I knew setting goals and surrounding myself with positive energy really helped me at that time to get through the beginning of my lung cancer journey.

Now, after almost 10 years of living with lung cancer, I continue to set traveling goals, and it really helps me. I travel so much that I decided to become an independent travel agent, and now I get to do what I love most.

So, you see, there is hope! Hope is around us every day, from the littlest to the biggest things in our lives. I now have much more hope because I have two beautiful grandchildren who give me hope. They remind me to continue to fight and be around, so I can now see them grow.

When you feel hopeless, find something that gives you hope and run with it. Set goals to help you get through this crazy journey of ours; trust me, it helps!