Coping After Cancer | Cancer.Net

During the last few months, or maybe longer, you have been focused on your cancer treatment and recovery. Finishing treatment is exciting, but it can also be challenging and even frightening. Resuming a normal schedule after treatment can be difficult and may require you to redefine what you consider normal. Give yourself time and find support, if needed, as you adjust to physical and emotional changes during this transition.

Emotional changes

Along with feeling happy, relieved, and excited, it is normal to experience mixed emotions:

Scared that the cancer may come back again
Anxious about returning to work or to school (Learn more about Returning to Work After Cancer and Returning to School After Cancer.)
Self-conscious about how you look, possibly because of scars from treatment or hair that hasn't grown back yet (Learn more about Cancer and Body Image.)
Upset that you can't do some of the things you used to because of changes in your body or emotions
Isolated from your friends
Guilty that you are recovering while some of your friends with cancer are not yet recovering or may have died
Worried about your own recovery—you may feel lost without the regular support and reassurance provided by your doctors and nurses
Worried about medical bills and health insurance
Uncertain about your future
A sense of loss for how your life may have been if you had not been diagnosed with cancer

Expect some changes

You will probably find that you're not quite the same as you were before you had cancer. Any major experience like cancer can make you look at your life in a new way. You may find that your priorities and goals have changed. You may reconsider your career choice, your educational goals, or some of your relationships. It is common to have questions about the future. Many cancer survivors also find meaning in their cancer experience and gain a new perspective on life. Many cancer survivors feel the need to share their story and help others living with cancer. Although you don't have cancer anymore, being a cancer survivor will always be a part of who you are.

Coping with change

Some young adults find that they need help coping with changes in their lives after cancer. Here are some suggestions that have helped other young cancer survivors:

Keep talking about how you're feeling, with a close friend, your parents or other family member, your nurse or doctor, or a counselor.
Look forward to having new friends, including others with cancer.
Keep in touch with others with cancer you have met, including young adults you may have met in online support groups.
Keep going to support groups and, if possible, join a support group just for young adult cancer survivors.
Keep writing in your journal, or start a journal if you don't already have one.
Find a way to help other young adult cancer survivors.
Do things you enjoy. Taking a break from cancer is important.

More Information

Cancer.Net: Cancer Survivorship

Cancer.Net: Cancer in Young Adults