Life is normal enough now that I almost forgot that 6 years ago today, my life changed forever.

I was lying in bed and my hand brushed over my upper chest and I noticed it.

A lump.

A lump that turned out to be breast cancer, after a mammogram several days later, after which the radiologist said "it's cancer," and a biopsy the following week that confirmed it.

I ended up undergoing bilateral mastectomies, radiation, and chemotherapy.

My breast cancer and the side effects from cancer cost me what would have been the final ten to twelve years of my medical career. 

Hopefully it won't cost me my life.

Over the following year as I recovered from treatment, I spent a lot of time researching things, and I learned a lot.

I discovered that there were likely 3 main things that increased my risk of breast cancer – a high-stress life, my diet (too much meat and dairy along with my veggies and fruit), and being overweight, the result of the first two coupled with decreased mobility due to a long-standing foot injury for which I had undergone foot reconstruction only 8 weeks prior to finding my breast lump.

I knew those things had to change.

I had to change.

I changed my diet and I lost the weight I had put on courtesy of menopause and the stress and my prior diet.

But equally importantly, I turned my life around in terms of how I deal with stress, how I think about things, and how I handle my emotions.

A big part of that was all that I learned through working with coaches and becoming certified as a coach myself and coaching others.

I knew I did not want what happened to me to happen to anyone else.

And for those to whom it had already happened, I wanted to help them dig their way out of it faster and more easily than I did when I had to figure it all out for myself.

So now I help not only people who have issues with weight and emotional eating, I help professionals who are struggling in other areas of their lives as well...

...To learn how not to stress about everything.

...To learn how to receive help, and even ask for it.

...To learn how to lose weight easily by uncoupling emotions from eating and to deal with the emotions in ways that allow them to be felt and released rather than wallowed in (without having to restrict the types of foods they like to eat)

...To learn how to take action and live the life they were meant to live.

...To design and create their dream job, relationships, and life.

So while I lost my medical career, I found a fulfilling new one in which I can help others in new ways that I never would have thought possible.

Am I sorry I got cancer? Of course.

But I've learned that things don't happen TO you, they happen FOR you.

And I'm SO grateful for all the people and the opportunities that have come into my life as a direct result. And I wouldn’t trade that for the world.

So I'm here to pay that forward to the universe, and to all of you.

If your life doesn't look exactly the way you want it to, or if you are struggling in any way, with any part of your life, please get help.

Ask for what you need. Most people are more than happy to help - think about how you feel when you get to help others.

What I really want to say is this:

I am here for you if you need me.

Just ask.

Write to me at [email protected]  and let me know what you'd like help with, or book a call (see links below).

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Write to me at [email protected] to let me know what you'd like help with, or book a call:

Stress/overwhelm/work-life/relationship issues: endselfsabotagenow.com

Weight loss or emotional eating:  releaseemotionaleating.com

Stress-Free Professionals and Entrepreneurs Facebook Group:

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