I’ve taken a year-long vacation from blogging. During this time I cared for a family member with severe dementia, and nursed him through to the end-of-life in hospice. It was the culmination of four years of caregiving filled with anguish, love, and major health care advocacy. It was a complete 180 being a caregiver instead of a patient. Focusing on Alzheimer’s, a disease for which there is no cure or treatment, presented its own separate challenge and fight.
It was hard to stop blogging. I was addicted. But I needed to cut from my life many things I loved in order to focus my attention, almost 100%, on being a caregiver. Ultimately, it has been good for me to not focus so heavily on my own illness and on young adult cancer. I have discovered other parts of my identity that lay outside of my own oncology experience.
I’ve decided to resume blogging, though with a lot of new work on my plate, I’m modifying my approach. I might post less frequently and have decided to discontinue the comment section. I’ve loved all the dialogue created here over the past three years (just dive into the archives for some juicy conversation). I hope you will continue to link to my posts on your blogs, facebook pages, and twitter feeds, where you can moderate your own heated and fruitful debates about young adult cancer issues.
As always, I continue to respond personally to every email I get from a cancer patient or loved one. You can find my email address on the contact page above.
Wishing you strength, smarts, and maybe a bit of vengeance on your cancer journey.
Over and out,
Kairol
“Everything Changes is, without doubt, the most forthright, emotionally sophisticated, and plain-old valuable book of its kind I've seen.”
