Cancer and the three stages of grief: where to find hope and how to lower your anxiety as you fight the disease
- People experience a range of emotions after being told they have cancer – grief, anger, guilt and fear among them. They may feel hopeless but they can fight it
- Hong Kong survivor Keith Yip received encouragement from his family and a support group to ‘face life with a positive spirit’, he says ahead of World Cancer Day
Keith Yip was 34 years old when he was diagnosed with stage 3 liver cancer in March 2017.
His first reaction was one of complete disbelief. He told himself that the diagnosis wasn’t real and tried to get a second opinion from other specialists.
He also feared how his wife of one year would take the news.
“She was distraught, to say the least,” says Yip, now 39, who works for a cleaning services company in Hong Kong. “I felt depressed thinking about how we’d pay our bills if I lost my ability to work, plus we were newly married and wanted to start a family.”
Over the following months, during which time he says he “faced reality”, Yip had surgery to remove the tumour in his liver. He thought that would put him in the clear, so he was shocked to learn in late 2017 that the cancer had returned.
He immediately underwent a series of chemotherapy treatments, which caused him a lot of pain and discomfort. The experience shattered his expectation of a recovery and left him feeling helpless and hopeless.