Sometimes I feel that there are tiny little cliques within the cancer community. Groups that don't want to share their struggle with anyone else. I remember when I was starting my website, well to be honest still starting my website, that the reaction I mostly received was "Yes, well we only deal with breast cancer" or "We already donate to breast cancer projects" and I realized that although there are a lot of young men and women out there with other types of cancer, there is no voice. There is no united cancer community. We are silos of disease, focusing on our own type of cancer, negating the fact that others have also gone through chemo, radiation, the loss of a body part or a loss of freedom, a loss of youth even. As a young woman, the focus is mostly on breast cancer, or any type of womanly cancer. And here I am, with Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma ( a decidely "old man" type of cancer, but growing in the younger population at an alarming rate) and feeling so left out. There are no scarves dedicated to my disease. No magazine articles. No products that will benefit the funds that fuel the research that will get me well. Isn't that sad? That for some reason I'm looking for acceptance inside a community that no one wants to be a part of in the first place? The other frightening thing is the belief that so many people have that whatever is out there, addressing the needs of a young survivor. Or a young patient. Also when attempting to start my website I found myself constatntly saying "But I was the person looking for the information, I couldn't find it. Show me where it is, " and they couldn't but still refused to believe that what I was doing was filling a need. Tell me where are the websites that tell me how to date again? Or to help my parents deal with the fact that their daughter who has been living on her own for sometime now needs them but also needs to retain some level of freedom? Or those people in college or grad school and where to they pick up? Where's the websites that tell me how not to look so sallow and pale or how to find the perfect headscarf? What about helping me with the weight gain? Something? Anything. Something that addresses me as the whole person and not the type of cancer. And I can't even imagine what it is like for young men.

the funny thing is that radiation leaves me at risk for a myriad of problems: breast cancer, lung cancer, skin cancer and heart disease. And is that fair? that once in my life I had to deal with losing a part of myself only to discover that what cured me of one has left me prone to others? that someday I just might be giving myself up piece by piece. And yet, I find myself constantly around the competition of "whose pain is worse." And i would gladly lose because I don't want to be in pain. I don't want to have the suckiest day or the hardest news to take. I would happily hand it all over. And yet, the ironic part, is that I wind up fighting for the recognition. The recongition of what I went through and what I feel and what I'll continue going through. So a part of me wants nothing more to forget, to have the scars on my body disappear and the only remnants of the disease can be found in the get well cards stored in my closet. And another, wears the scars like a badge, screaming for the attention of "Look what I went through" and remembering that there is no forgetting. At least for me. I can't escape it and I'm learning to embrace it. And someday, I'll be able to tell all survivors and patients, "We are all truly in this together. "

It's a club that I'd happily turn my membership in but it looks like I've got the lifetime membership anyway.