Learning to thrive again when life brings you to your knees

When you step into the storm of your sorrow, you can not only recover, but rebuild a life that’s richer than before

- Annabel Chown

I was 30 years old when the words ‘You have cancer’ were hurled like a grenade into my world of work, the gym, and Saturday-night parties. With a bald head and a 10cm scar slashed across my left breast, I feared no man would ever desire me again. I acquired a deep distrust of my body, every cough and twinge magnified – in my mind – to a secondary and incurable cancer. But I also acquired, during that time, a sense of wonder for the seemingly ordinary. Like the coppery autumn leaves crunching beneath my feet as I walked to radiotherapy.

And the life I rebuilt post-cancer was, in many ways, more meaningful than the one I’d had before: 60-hour weeks at the office replaced by freelance architecture work from my kitchen table; evening treadmill runs usurped by candlelit yoga classes; and being too busy for holidays giving way to trips to Australia and India. Cancer showed me how precious and finite life is, and gave me the opportunity to resculpt my own, creating one that was more in alignment with what I truly valued.

Then, 16 years later, at 39 weeks pregnant, a police officer informed me my sister was dead. After five years trying to conceive, it was meant to be such a joyful time. Now, I was questioning how I’d cope without my only sibling.

My son arrived nine days after my sister’s sudden death. I lay in my hospital bed with him draped across my chest. He was beautiful. Perfect. But a stranger. And as I cuddled him, it was the familiar embrace and scent of my sister I longed for.