OK, I messed up. My last post, from last Wednesday, was supposed to be published today. But I wasn't paying attention and I just hit the "post" button instead of setting a future date, so that left me with too much time between posts. I've been spending a few days with some family that I don't get to see very often, so I thought I'd write a post and have it all set to go so I wouldn't need to worry about it and I could focus on my nieces and nephews and great-nephews. So much for that plan.
So you're getting a kind of bonus post today.
I want to let you know that the Follicular Lymphoma Foundation is doing a webinar on January 28 called "Living with FL: Coping with the Down Days." It is happening live at 2.00pm GMT (6.00am PT; 10.00pm UTC; 9.00am ET). It should be excellent.
The webinar will be led by Dr. Mitchell Smith, the FLF Chief Medical Officer, who always does a fantastic job with these webinars, asking the right questions and leading the discussion in productive ways. The FLF always includes a medical expert, and this time it will be Surabhi Chaturvedi, an integrative psychotherapist with a background in clinical psychology. She works specifically with patients with blood cancers. And there's always a patient expert, too, who talks about their own experience. This time, it's Dr Claire Hucker, who is a GP with the NHS. In addition to being a medical doctor, she was diagmosed with FL in 2019, when she was in her 40's. She received O-CHOP as a treatment, which was successful. Dr. Hucker should provide a very interesting perspective on this.
You can read more about the webinar and register at this link. If you can't make it, a recording of the webinar will be posted online on the FLF website, where you can find all of their webinars.
I expect the webinar to have lots of good practical advice for dealing with the bad days that we all have sometimes.
A couple of other resources for you:
The title of the webinar resonates with me. There's a bit of advice that I give other cancer patients (when they ask me for advice) -- it's OK to have a bad day. Sometimes we feel the pressure to be positive, especially because lots of well-meaning tell us that we "need to stay positive." That's usually good advice, but not always. You can click here to read more about what I have to say about having a bad day.
Another resource is a recent episode of the Follicular Lymphoma Community Podcast called "FL and the Holidays." I know we're past "the holidays" now that's the middle of January, but the episode is kind of timeless. When we have "bad days," it's often for the same kinds of reasons that the holidays can get us down -- we're exhausted, we're overwhelmed, we've set expectations that we can't live up to. All of those things can be highlighted during the busy holiday season, but they happen at all times of the year. So if you need some advice and you can't wait for January 28, watch the FL Community Podcast and get great advice from some other FL patients. (Just ignore their festive hats ad sweaters,)
I hope you enjoy your "bonus post" and take advantage of the good advice I have posted.
Even better -- I hope you don't need it.
Take care, The diagnosiversary post is coming up next.
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