My first awareness of cancer as something to fear was when I was eleven and visiting my mother’s parents in New Zealand. We traveled from Montreal, Canada, to spend the holidays with my mother’s parents. It rained a lot during that visit, and my younger brother had a cold. Because he had a cold and because my grandfather was dying from cancer, my grandfather stayed in his room, and we were not allowed to see him, “In case you get him sick,” the adults told us.

My grandfather was an engineer with Boeing Airlines, and he, along with the other engineers, was exposed to various chemicals during the course of their work. This, we were told, was why he had cancer, leukemia, to be exact.

“Your grandmother has died from cancer,” I was told by my parents. My father’s mother had been a chronic smoker. I was thirteen. When I was nineteen, it was my uncle’s turn. His cancer had spread throughout his body. He also was a smoker. I lit a candle for him at Chartres Cathedral in Paris. My boyfriend and I were backpacking across Europe that summer.

At this time, it was commonly accepted by Western medicine that cancer was genetic and inevitable if it ran in your family. I suppose it did in mine, by all accounts. I don’t do well with inevitabilities, however. The moment I am told there is only one way, I immediately start looking for another.

I read an interesting article in my early twenties that followed members of a family from a small town in Nova Scotia that was rife with cancer. It was also a mining town. Since the founding of the town, generations of women suffered and died from breast cancer. It was inevitable.

Until some members of the family in question moved away to start their lives in the big city. These women did not develop breast cancer. Nature vs Nurture? Not inevitable?

From here, it was a short hop in my mind to what else might be causing people to die from cancer, and, if not inevitable, perhaps it was possible to live with cancer rather than die from it; maybe it was not only possible to cure cancer but to never have it in the first place.

I began studying cancer and its treatments, both conventional and non-conventional. I read studies on environmental, emotional, and spiritual factors. Research that looked at the effects of chronic stress and unresolved grief on the development of certain cancers and what the underlying emotion was for areas in the body where cancer can develop:

• A broken and unhealed heart for breast cancer
• Unresolved grief for lung cancer
• Deep loneliness for colon cancer

This was practical science and research; it wasn’t whoo-hoo. What I learned is that cancer is complex. It isn’t simply a bundle of cells gone haywire in the body. There are layers and aspects to cancer that paint a holistic picture of a person’s complete health, physical, mental, and spiritual.

I have worked with many clients in my healing practice who are living with cancer; at least they begin living with cancer rather than dying from it when we start working together on their cancer journey. I’m not an oncologist or a medical doctor. My approach is to help support my clients in whatever way they need me to do so. If they choose conventional Western medicine, I help them navigate the side effects of these treatments with food, herbs, and essential oils. I listen to their fears and hopes and help them focus on the outcome they want.

If a client wants to completely change their lifestyle—diet, exercise, perspective, spiritual practices—I’m their holistic life coach, helping them learn to live the healthiest life they can.

For one dear friend, when she received her first diagnosis of cancer, we worked together to support her as she went through rounds of chemo and radiation and the side effects. She was clear that she wanted support in living. She was cancer-clear for almost a year. When she received the second diagnosis of cancer, she asked me to help her to be as comfortable as possible as she died, which I did with massage, evenings on the porch watching the sunset, and holding her hand on the day of her death.

Cancer has not been my journey, although there was a brush with it in my early twenties when I was told I had pre-cancerous cells on my cervix. A painful procedure followed. My personal choice now in my fifties is to focus on prevention from a place of honoring my body as opposed to fearing a possible diagnosis. I use food, essential oils, plants, and botanicals—everything I’ve learned about supporting my health and wellness from years of study and exploration.

I don’t know what my emotional response would be to a diagnosis of cancer; maybe fear at first, but not for long. For me, it would be a wake-up call, an opportunity to take a deep look at how I’m living my life, what still needs healing, and how I could best live with it or heal it.

Can cancer be a gift? I think so, and not only to the person who has it but to all the people along the way—friends, family, caregivers—an opportunity to tune in, check-in, and examine our beliefs about living and dying. It can be a gift, but not an inevitable one.

Megan Edge is a Master Healer, Intuitive Educator, Counsellor, and author of The Heart’s Journey: Healing Hearts Oracle Cards & Guidebook. She offers Mind, Body, and Soul™ healing through Energy Healing, Intuitive Counselling, Body Work, & Essential Oils. In her private practice, Megan holds space for personal healing, empowering the individual to access their own healing powers. She believes each of us has the potential to unlock our healing abilities, both for ourselves and for others.

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