What did you do differently after your second diagnosis and how do you think this has helped you to stay cancer-free for 16 years and counting? 

I thought I had done everything I could [when I received my first diagnosis], but I realised that I didn't touch on the emotional aspect. I was strong and I didn't allow myself to be vulnerable and ask for help. I wanted to prove to myself and to everybody else that I was fine. But you don't need to find everything out on your own—you can ask for help. It's courageous to ask for help.

[When I received my second diagnosis] I started thinking about what helps me on an emotional level and at that moment that was yoga. I quickly moved into nutrition, and realised that often we think we eat healthily but there are things that are missing or things that are not good for you at that moment in your life. And then there was exercise, which was something I definitely hadn’t used as a tool as much as I could have. The other most underestimated tool is good sleep. When you are young you think you are strong and don't need that many hours of sleep, but I realised how sleep deprived I'd been many years before my diagnosis and that this was an aspect I needed to tackle and take seriously. I made sleep a huge priority and I'm still very protective around my sleep.

Why did you decide to become a cancer coach? 

There was an intense need to give meaning to all of this. I was the main caregiver to my mother when she went through cancer—unfortunately she battled for two years and passed away—so I had seen cancer from a caregiver’s point of view. And then I went through cancer myself and then had a recurrence. So I felt I had seen so many aspects of a cancer journey and I needed to use it in a positive and constructive way. The question then was, how do you do that?

At the beginning it was about gathering as much information as I could, and understanding that there was one way that I felt, but how did others feel? What were their biggest challenges? I spoke to a lot of people, particularly women, going through this to understand what they were lacking. What would be helpful for them? And step by step, I created this service to address those needs.

What did you feel was lacking on your journey and how did that compare to the other women you spoke to ?

I couldn’t find answers to many of the questions I was asking or the kind of support I was looking for. I wanted somebody who had been through this, but who had knowledge and statistics and could also give me very practical help. Many of the women I spoke to said the same—they felt a deep need to talk to somebody who had been through it. They said, ‘We respect what the doctors tell us, but there is always this little voice saying, you really don't know how it feels because you have never gone through it’. 

[As patients,] we need two things—emotional support and very practical help, which I find very much missing in this whole journey. It’s being able to ask certain questions to somebody who has gone through it. For example, how does it feel when the chemotherapy gets into your body? Do you immediately feel sick? How did you feel the first time you saw yourself in the mirror with no hair? What clothes should I wear after a mastectomy? These are things that are difficult to know if you haven't gone through it. I'm very open—there's no question that clients are not allowed to ask me. 

As a cancer coach, do you help with all forms of cancer? 

Because of my story, many of my clients are breast cancer patients, and often young breast cancer patients because they feel there are a lot of parallels between our stories. But I also see people with every type of cancer, mainly women—for whom it’s mainly breast, ovarian and colon, and for men it's mainly prostate and brain cancer.

Describe your role as a cancer coach

I am here to support cancer patients during and after treatment, for their emotional well-being and for their quality of life. I don't put my clients at any risk. [My suggestions] don’t interfere with any treatment. But I'm not here to cure them. I don't have this ability. I also never give any kind of medical advice or opinion on a medical treatment. A lot of clients want my opinion on their treatment or when doctors give them an option they want me to make a decision for them. I would never do that. However, I help them to have more health literacy to understand the pros and cons and to make a detailed list of questions to ask their medical team so they have a better understanding.

How do you cope emotionally? 

It’s important in this kind of job to be able to keep a healthy distance and I find I am able to do that very intuitively. When I'm in a session, I'm 100 percent there. I have empathy, I hear my clients. I make them feel heard and understood, but at the same time my brain goes to how can I help? 

The main thing is that I need to have energy. I work on my energy every day and protect it, and to do that I [use] everything that I also teach my clients. So, I'm very protective of my sleep. I need my sleep to be able to process all these emotions, and to have the energy levels that clients need from me. I also spend a lot of time outdoors. For me being outdoors is the best medicine. It gives me a lot of energy and refills my batteries. I have my little rituals too. I never take clients back to back and after every session I have some time for myself where I sit and do some breathing exercises and have a moment of closure and say, ‘Okay, this is what you can bring to the table.’ I always have to remind myself how I helped this person and that the person was better at the end of the session than at the beginning.

What is the best advice you would give to cancer patients? 

The biggest mistake is to think that you can't do anything, that you are helpless and that you can't Influence any of this. It's about understanding where you can regain some kind of power and how to use it in the best possible way. Because there's a sense of being overwhelmed and of being powerless, but to have an active role in this whole journey puts you in a completely different position. 

There’s also this pressure to be positive all the time. We all know that mindset is crucial. And that it's important to be positive and have a positive outlook. But on the other hand we need to find the right balance. We need to have a safe space where you can let go of negative emotions and where you feel allowed to say, ‘You know what? Today I'm not feeling good’, or ‘Today I feel sad or even angry or unfairly treated by life’. It's important to be able to express this, and the simple act of expressing this is already therapeutic. So, find this right balance. 

Breast cancer is the most common cancer in the world. What can we do to address this?  

I recommend that every woman start doing self examinations. It’s a way that we can empower ourselves. And we should start as soon as possible, and certainly by the age of 30 it should be part of a routine. We all think about it in October when it's Breast Cancer Awareness Month, but then we forget about it until next year. We should be doing a self examination of our breasts every month. And it's not something to be stressed about. The reality is that the better you get to know how your breasts feel and how they look, [the better] you will be able to detect any changes, which could appear in structure, colour or density, and be able to intervene.

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