First Book Review Published: “WHAT TO EAT IF YOU HAVE CANCER (A GUIDE TO ADDING NUTRITIONAL THERAPY)”

Basically, I’m just supposed to be continuing what was supposed to be finished last November. But heck, I’m so near-finished now and I’m loving this theme I came up with, anyway. It’s making me want to continue writing again. I just almost gave up a few weeks ago (more on that some other time). I’m happy to share more of myself. So, to continue…

Day 26 of the #NaNoPoblano2021 challenge, now a.k.a. “NaJanPoblano2022” (heee….) . Major Theme: “A Few of My Earliest Things”. New sub-theme: “First Published”. Related post: My Evolution as a Writer. Related page: Critic’s Corner.

Until I joined the Philippines’ first (and maybe only) cancer-focused magazine, I had never really done a book review outside school. It was not something I was sure I was good at. Honestly, I’m still not sure I’m good at it. The best I can say is “I try.” I had no plans of writing any until the Publisher/Boss asked me to review a book that someone recommended to her. So I did and had my FIRST BOOK REVIEW PUBLISHED.

The book was “What to Eat if You Have Cancer” by nutritionist-authors Maureen Keane, MS and Daniella Chase, MS. I hardly imagined that I’d review a book for cancer survivors, let alone, a book giving dietary guidelines. I’m a fiction girl, ergo, I expected to review fiction if I would ever. But there I was. I also tended to write longer, so writing this short one was a challenge. I did it, though. I survived my initiation. The book is most probably very outdated now. I haven’t checked if they’ve written any updated ones.

After that, I would go on writing two more cancer-related non-fiction reviews. Surprisingly, it was I who volunteered! Those were books that I found. One was “My Breast” by former journalist Joyce Wadler and the other, “Cancer Schmancer” by comedienne Fran Drescher. I have shared both reviews here in my blog. These experiences gave me the courage to try and join a call for book review submissions. If you are interested, I reviewed Alice Walker’s “The Color Purple” and Victor Hugo’s classic “The Hunchback of Notre Dame”.

Anyway, I think it’s possible to read the words on the image that I have provided if you just enlarge it, except I just found out now that light reflected on some parts. Sorry! I know I have the soft copy somewhere but I have to find it first.

First Photo Essay Published: “THE MASKED ANGELS”

Day 20 of the #NaNoPoblano2021 challenge, now a.k.a. “NaDePoblano” (heee….) . Major Theme: “A Few of My Earliest Things”. New sub-theme: “My Firsts”. Related post: My Evolution as a Writer.

The publication I worked for was focused on cancer awareness and one of its major sections focused on children with cancer. I am not sure now if the original plan was, indeed, to create a photo essay for that issue, but I wrote an essay-slash-vignette. I don’t know if I pitched the idea of using it or the inspiration came because I was assigned the section. The bosses liked it, though. This came out in the same issue as that of the article I shared last time. I guess that technically, this should be my first published article as a professional. I didn’t/don’t really consider it that way, though. For me, it’s a story.

Now, I didn’t want to make anyone cry, but I heard feedback that it did make a few people teary-eyed. I felt good and bad–good that it was effective, bad that I didn’t want to make people cry at all, not because of cancer. I now realize while I write this that it wasn’t the first time I’d been told I made people cry. If memory serves me right, this was the fourth time that something I wrote (song, story, essay) had a similar effect. I don’t know why that is, to be honest.

The End Justifies the Journey

NOTE: This was written as a photo-essay about children in the cancer ward for The Big C magazine (January-March 2006, Children’s Hour section)

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Here where many wage wars, little heroes fight their own battles armed with a dash of hope and sprinkles of innocence, coated with a touch of loved ones’ tender loving care. Every smile has a story.

Imagination takes flight and little Masked Angels make where sweet dreams lie, to bask under the morning sun or traipse on a moonlit night calling out to friends hidden behind trees or under makeshift carton houses. “Pung! Huli ka!” they cry out racing towards the base to be saved.

They run and laugh and play. Sometimes they tumble. But heroes are made of sturdy stuff. After every fall they take a stand against unseen enemies in defiance. Sometimes, imagination flies back to the classroom—there’s the little girl he loves to…

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Memories of The Big C #MondayMemoirs

There was a time that I worked for an actual print publication. It was a health-and-lifestyle magazine though it was far from the ordinary. Ours was centered on cancer, its survivors, and how to overcome, fight and win against it. They were, for me, very interesting times.

Almost two weeks ago, I shared on my folio blog my experiences working for the mag and some of the insights that I gathered along the way.

So for today, since I am guessing you missed them, I am sharing my stories to you guys as well. Just click on the image and you’ll be good to go 🙂

My Big C memory lane

Fight Songs! #TuesdayTunes

Last year, I shared (more like reminded you of) this song, Just Stand Up. Well, it’s October once again, which is Breast Cancer Awareness Month  and my default All-Cancers Awareness Month.

Here are songs for our loved ones who continue to bravely fight the Big C, and for our loved ones who bravely did until God said it’s time to go home…

(Note: Most I got from AboveAndBeyondCancer.org)

“3AM” by Matchbox 20

“During a 2001 episode of VH1 Storytellers, Matchbox 20 vocalist Rob Thomas told the story of how he wrote this song, inspired by a difficult period of his life when his mother was dealing with cancer.” (AboveAndBeyondCancer.org)

“Good Riddance (Time of Your Life)” by Green Day

Not exactly a “cancer song” but it’s beautiful.

“Mission” by Lupe Fiasco

“Chicago rapper Lupe Fiasco describes this song ‘as a track to empower those facing cancer, revere cancer survivors and remember those who have passed to due to cancer related illnesses.’  This song nails the cancer fight in so many ways.” (AboveAndBeyondCancer.org) Rap song has some unwholesome words, though, so just a warning.

“Clouds” by Zach Sobiech

“In early 2013 the world was captivated by the amazing story of Minnesota osteosarcoma patient Zach Sobiech.  Zach’s cancer diagnosis…didn’t stop him from writing this beautiful song.” (AboveAndBeyondCancer.org)

“Hope” by Capri Ruberto

I honestly originally did not want to include this here for the simple fact that…it made me cry. But it’s so beautiful! A song written by Capri herself when she was 12 when her mother was diagnosed with cancer….This is the live version that tore my heart: “HOPE” Live.

And now, I saved this for last! I think this is the perfect fight cancer song even though I don’t think it was written for such purpose.

“Fight Song” by Rachel Platten

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For our loved ones.

My Breast ~ Joyce Wadler

Cancer: Zero

A journalist gets more personal with cancer

My Breast

By Joyce Wadler

176 pages

My Breast—no words could not be more apt than that. In Joyce Wadler’s book, her breast gets top billing and lands the title-role, having gained her respect as a separate entity with the power to destroy her. She learned it the hard way after all when in 1991, breast cancer interrupted her in the middle of working for People magazine as an investigative journalist, writing her dream book, freelancing for another publication, and trying to keep a rocky relationship stable.

The book actually starts with Wadler discussing where she wanted her lumpectomy scar—a bit of vanity there, she knows—and how she looked her tumor “in the eye.” Her sometimes matter-of-factly, no-nonsense approach already sets the tone to how she later discusses her life in succeeding chapters.

Wadler tells her story with honesty, warmth, wit, sometimes self-deprecation, feistiness, and street smarts. She launches a bit on her family and professional background that indirectly explains what and who she is. Inevitably, she has to mention a lover who is admittedly obsessed with someone else and whose support is not really all there. Hey, it’s her life, right?

Bright and humorous, she tackles her story with a light, sometimes funny, touch, like how she talked of her lump: “I’m starting to feel this thing has a life of its own…like it’s gonna come flying out of my body any minute, like that thing in Alien, and run around the living room and put on the sports channel and ask for a beer.” Most important, Wadler knows her readers want the truth and so she gives it to them.

In details, she describes what it felt like going under the knife (she opted to be awake), under treatment, under inner turmoil while she tried to be brave. She even describes how breast reconstruction is done. It is like a blow-by-blow account of a sort, very informative.

Medullary carcinoma, stage 2, that was what she had despite annual mammograms and having no history of breast cancer in the family. Hers is rare and quite curable, but then it is not something to be lax about. In most part of the book, Wadler tells of doing her own research (force of a journalist’s habit, perhaps), being very inquisitive to doctors and seeking second opinions. She laments how her pool of surgeons seemed to have contradicting opinions prompting her to ask a nursing assistant who exactly was in charge. She finally got her best answer: “…in a sense, you are.”

And so Wadler decided to have a more take-charge manner, making all the decisions when it came to her cancer. The book then ends while she is just sessions shy of completing chemotherapy.

My Breast was actually first published on April 13, 1992 in the New York magazine, stressing the importance of early detection and getting second opinions. It’s surprising readership success then led to Wadler expanding it to a whole book that also became a hit. Much later, it was to be made into a film shown on CBS Television.

Considering the year it was written, some bits of information are a bit antiquated, what with the advent of newer technologies now like the digital mammogram. However, her story is history and the book as a whole is still quite helpful and informative. Cancer, after all, is yet to be obsolete and who best to understand survivors than those who are survivors themselves?

After the book, the author became an advocate of breast cancer awareness, speaking at seminars about her bout with cancer. It was a bout she eventually won.

“Score – Joyce: One, Cancer: Zero.” Yes, she kept score.

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NOTE: This article was published in The Big C magazine (exact date to follow). To see more reviews, please visit my CRITIC’S CORNER….Thank you!

Fighting the Big C

Everyone of us has known, at least, one person who has suffered from cancer, whether it’s a loved one, a friend, a neighbor, a co-worker, someone who has served you,..any one.

Despite remembering learning of it while I was working for our cancer magazine, I do not remember who I heard it from, really. Was it from an article somewhere online, someone one of our writers interviewed, our publisher or our editor? I do know that, yes, there is a lot of truth in that. Cancer is everywhere.

In the very olden times, when the world was very, very young, it was very common for people to live way past their first hundred years. Today, reaching our 80s, 90s is already considered a feat. Why? Because Man–we–made it so. We created all these technological (supposed) developments that unfortunately resulted in all these pollutants around us. These are things our bodies try to reject daily, but they often successfully overcome us anyway.

In case you are unaware of it yet, October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month. Each month is an awareness month for different kinds of cancer actually. Regardless of which cancer for what month it is, it is always important to be aware of the dangers of cancer. It’s time that we always remember and learn from all those who have gone before us because of the Big C.

We should always remember, too, that whatever happens, we must never give and just stand up against cancer. In fact, that’s an advice worth taking and applying in every aspect of our lives.