It’s true. I’m not the only person who writes about cancer in a blog. It turns out that these here InterWebs are full of conversations and observations and ramblings and rants and meditations and monologues galore, focused on all things cancer. And, while it may not be a shock that I enjoy reading some cancer blogs, the surprise is really how darn good many of them are. Now, because I have lung cancer, I tend to gravitate toward reading the experiences of others with the same condition. And I may be biased in thinking that lung cancer brings out the best writers. But I am going to throw it out there that, at the very least, what I am about to share is some very good work by some dedicated people with important stories worth reading. I’m not going to rank the best lung cancer blog or set up any sort of competition here. I just feel that these are other experiences from other people that I would like to share with you.
I’m targeting other writers with metastatic lung cancer, partly to show that I am not a complete outlier. While this disease is still killing an inordinately high number of people, the cancer blogs I’m linking here tell an uplifting, inspiring story, especially when taken as a collective whole.
The Cancer Blogs
Janet Freeman-Daily is an aerospace engineer turned lung cancer advocate who was diagnosed in 2011. She writes about Gratitude on her blog, Grey Connections, and her posts also appear on the useful website for Cure magazine. She also has a terrific list of other lung cancer blogs which is much more exhaustive and interesting than what I am including here, and it includes detail on each author’s age at the date of diagnosis along with the type of lung cancer.
Emily Bennett Taylor is one of those shockingly inspirational young people that you occasionally come across in life. She was an athlete in her late 20s when she received her startling diagnosis about two and a half years ago. Last month, she posted an entry in her blog that brought tears to my eyes. In the best possible way. I’ve followed her story for a while now and really felt a personal connection to her struggles and success. Emily is a spokesperson for the Bonnie J. Addario Lung Cancer Foundation and you can see her in some of their videos.
Lisa Goldman is another in a long string of young, non-smoking lung cancer patients. I think I relate to her wit and pluck, and the fact that her two kids are about the same age as my daughter. She has a great attitude, as all of these folks do. And her blog, although about cancer, is really about living. She also sells this shirt:
Lungs. They’re Right Under Your Boobs! Shirt by EveryBreathITake
Shop for Lung T-Shirts online at Zazzle.com
I know that my list is a little female-centric. And in a way, this isn’t going to change with the next blog. Molly Golbons was 39 and a mother of two young girls when she received her diagnosis. And while she is the center of an Emmy-winning documentary about her progress, she is no blogger. But her husband is. And what is great about his blog is that he tries to make it not about cancer, but about life with his daughters and his wife — including, but not limited to, her trials and tribulations related to her lung cancer. And sometimes, like another truly awesome blogger you may have read, he writes posts that have nothing to do with cancer at all. The best parts of the blog, for me, anyway, are that it is from the perspective of the caregiver rather than the patient — and also from the perspective of a father, which I can relate to. In many ways, just a breath of fresh air.