I survived breast cancer, and writing gratitude journal partially saved me (but that’s not the whole story).
My primary doctor sat me down in the examination room. He looked at the monitor and glanced at the clipboard in front of him.
He said, “You know this already, that the biopsy report shows cancer.”
I didn’t say anything. I cried with my husband already the day before, and the doctor knows I was holding back my tears.
“The good thing is that we caught it early.” He said. “It’s less than 1 cm, and it’s not even considered stage 1.”
I nodded, and faked a smile.
He continued, “I wish I can tell you that the biopsy is negative but it’s not. Again, technology have jumped leaps and bounds and we have good medicine for this”.
He paused, and continued.
“You know what? I have patients who are in their 70’s now and totally forgot that they fought breast cancer before.”
“Really?”, I asked.
“Yes. The diameter of this cancer is so small, that we can eliminate this easy.”
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Even with my doctor’s reassurance, I was scared. My oncologist who reported the biopsy didn’t even have the bedside manner to tell me the bad news properly.
In the end, the large university hospital that I was going to recommended that I see a psychologist. My primary doctor also recommended that I consult a doctor who specializes in integrative medicine.
I followed their advice and while I was in radiation (there was no chemotherapy, thank God but the radiation was the same as chemotherapy, awful), I visited these specialists.
During one my integrative medicine doctors, she recommended to change my diet and go for organic foods as much as possible. Put more cabbage and mushroom in the table too.
But what surprised me most was her insistence of writing a gratitude journal
WHAT’S GRATITUDE JOURNAL FOR THEN?
It was hard for me to follow their advice, but in the end, I did it for my family and kids.
My husband bought me a specific notebook just for gratitude journaling.
I wrote:
Thank you for, my husband, my family, my kid, my parents….
..and so on every morning.
Other evenings, I will just write what made my day beautiful or what were specific situations that made my day. This could be as simple as my husband “putting toothpaste on my toothbrush when I’m ready to brush”
Or, could be moments with my kid when he asked “how do you divide a negative number?”
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After a year of writing my journal, I wrote a specific journal just for my husband. It was 2019 when I started writing 5 things I was thankful for my husband, every day.
I gave that Journal to him that year on Thanksgiving, and he was very thankful for it. He told me it was one of the best gifts he received for a long time.
As a scientist though, I always wonder why would Gratitude Journals work, especially for a stressed out cancer survivor like me.
It turns out our brain is designed to find negative things in every situation. It’s just the nature of the brain, because the brain’s job is to protect us.
During our ancestor’s time, the brain will scan the perimeter for “negatives” such as a lion ready to attack us.
Gratitude journal forces the negative thoughts out of our mind. Positive feelings and negative feelings occupies the precious real estate of our mind, but they can’t be both at the same time.
Gratitude journal un-sit our deep rooted negative thoughts out of our mind.
Today, I go to YouTube, search for Tony Robins’ gratitude or priming videos. Every morning, I listen to this video. It’s only five minutes long, especially the one Tony made for Oprah Winfrey.
Again, it’s only five minutes (don’t tell me you don’t have five minutes because it only shows you don’t have a life too).
It made wonders to my positive outlook in life. I recommend you try it.
Be open minded too.
