When I was eight, my mum was diagnosed with Stage 3 Breast Cancer. It happened on my father’s birthday, and for years after, he refused to celebrate that day until my mum had fully recovered.
Only recently, I began to think about the consequences of this on my childhood and the kind of person I grew up to be. Up until I was 17 when one of my classmates told me her mother had passed away due to cancer, I was blissfully unaware of how catastrophic cancer could be. As a child, I had difficulty comprehending the idea that I might lose my mother and the gravity of the issue beyond ‘mommy is sick’ was never made fully clear to my younger sister or me. I remember visiting my mother once– before she was due to have a critical surgery– and my father telling me she was pretty worried without much context for the significance of this surgery. We were lucky enough to have private treatment. Although I don’t remember the exact name of the hospital, I remember there was a lot of natural lighting, white walls and high ceilings and a wall-mounted TV that was better than what we had at home. As soon as I walked in and saw the look on my mother’s face, I instinctually did what any child would do. I made up a song on the spot called ‘Get Well, Mommy’ and performed it together with my sister. There’s probably an embarrassing video on one of my dad’s derelict cameras somewhere. I remember how happy she was when we did that.
According to the WHO, there were 20 million new cases of cancer and 10 million deaths globally because of it in 2023. With that comes maybe more than 50 million people who would’ve been affected by it in some way, shape or form. Luckily for me, my mother was able to recover, but I know a lot of people whose loved ones were in the same situation who were not so fortunate. While I wasn’t very close with him, my grand-uncle passed away when I was around 16 from pancreatic cancer. Likewise, in university, I continually met people who had one of their parents pass due to some form of cancer, constantly reminding me how blessed I was to still have my mum with me.
Now 22, and after watching Miyazaki’s latest masterpiece, The Boy and The Heron, a film that more or less centres around a mother-son relationship, I started to contemplate my mother’s illness’s impact on me. For one, I realised that because my father would always stay with my mother whenever she had treatments. Cancer, coupled with the fact that my parents had worked long hours even before, meant that I had very little interaction with them in the years that it mattered the most. My parents were great role models, but this disease stole so much time from us. The time that we were meant to spend together.
A lot of my frustrations, as a result, stem from lessons I didn’t learn earlier, whether it be wishing I had better Cantonese or starting to learn music earlier, frustrations which would likely not have existed or wouldn’t have been so prominent if this curse had not existed in the first place. But everything is more apparent in hindsight, all the what-ifs and maybes. Maybe I wouldn’t have had as much drive to do and learn as much as I do if I didn’t feel like I had time stolen from me because of my mother’s cancer. Maybe I should just be grateful that my mother is still with me. With all that considered, I can’t help but see how much this disease has shaped who I am and my relationship with my parents. Sometimes, it still feels like they are making up for lost time, treating me like a child up until I was 18. While it was suffocating, I would only understand it in university when I had some time away and could look at things more objectively to know why they acted that way. You can’t change the past, so the best thing you can do is make peace with it and have hope for the future. This understanding of self has shaped the core of my writing: trying to understand why I am the way I am and writing about it to help others figure out why they are the way they are.
Bottom line? Fuck cancer.
On this day, consider this a public service announcement. If you know people in your family are prone to higher risks of cancer, get yourself checked. Don’t put your loved ones through this kind of grief. I highly recommend getting a genetics test like Circle DNA or 23AndMe if you are unsure and have the money for it. I did one recently and found out I have similar risk factors as my mum. However, because of this awareness, I can confidently take as many precautions as I can to prevent cancer. Simple things like regular exercise, a healthy diet and daily sunscreen can go a long way in preventing cancer. Also, don’t waste time not showing the people you love how much you care about them. Life’s too short for that. Happy World Cancer Day!
