by Bag It Team | Nov 10, 2026 | Educational Articles
How to Find Connection, Strength, and Support Throughout A Cancer Experience
November is a time when gratitude often takes center stage. But when cancer touches your life, thankfulness can take on a much deeper and sometimes more complicated meaning.
A cancer diagnosis can change nearly everything. It can bring uncertainty, fear, difficult decisions, unexpected challenges, and a range of emotions that are hard to put into words. For patients, caregivers and families, the journey can be exhausting. And while there may be moments of gratitude along the way, there are also moments when simply getting through the day is enough.
Gratitude doesn’t mean being thankful for cancer, overlooking the difficult parts of the experience, or feeling pressure to maintain a positive attitude. Instead, it’s about recognizing the people, moments, resources and acts of kindness that make a difference, even during challenging times.
This November, we’re reflecting on the power of gratitude and the role it plays throughout the cancer experience as well as recognizing the many people who make a difference in the lives of those impacted by cancer.
Gratitude in Cancer Care: The Importance of Support and Connection
Cancer care is about more than medical appointments, treatment plans, and test results. It’s also about the people who walk alongside patients, the resources that help make complicated information easier to understand, and the support systems that remind individuals and families they aren’t alone.
A knowledgeable healthcare professional who takes time to answer questions, a friend who shows up with a meal, a family member who accompanies someone to an appointment or an organization that provides reliable information at the right time can make a meaningful difference.
Sometimes gratitude is found in the smallest moments: a thoughtful phone call, a helping hand, a meaningful conversation, or simply knowing someone is there when you need them.
These connections can offer comfort and encouragement when the cancer experience feels overwhelming. They remind us that support comes in many forms and that no one should have to navigate cancer alone.
Gratitude in Action: The People Who Make a Difference
Supporting someone through cancer takes a community. At Bag It Cancer, we see this every day through the individuals and organizations who help make our mission possible.
Since our founding in 2003, our mission has been to educate, support, and empower those impacted by cancer. What began with a simple idea—to help people feel more informed and prepared after a cancer diagnosis—has grown into a nationwide effort to provide trusted information and practical resources to patients, caregivers, and families.
We are continually reminded that this work would not be possible without the generosity and dedication of others.
We are grateful for:
- Our donors and sponsors, whose generosity helps us put valuable resources into the hands of people who need them.
- Our volunteers, who give their time, energy, and talents to advance our mission.
- Our healthcare partners, who help connect patients with reliable information and tools throughout their cancer experience.
- Our nonprofit and community partners, who collaborate with us to develop cancer-specific resources and reach more individuals and families.
- Our advocates, who share their experiences, raise awareness, and work to improve the cancer experience for others.
- Our patients, caregivers, and families, who inspire us every day and remind us why this work matters.
Every Bag It Bag distributed, every resource shared, and every partnership developed represents an opportunity to make someone’s cancer experience a little less overwhelming.
We are especially grateful for the individuals and organizations who believe that access to reliable cancer information and support should be available to everyone. Together, we can reach more people, fill gaps in support and help ensure no one has to navigate their cancer experience alone.
Gratitude as a Patient: Recognizing the People and Moments That Help
A cancer diagnosis can make it difficult to know what comes next. Patients are often faced with unfamiliar terminology, treatment decisions, new healthcare providers, and an overwhelming amount of information.
During this time, gratitude may come in unexpected ways.
It might be the nurse who takes an extra few minutes to explain something. The friend who remembers an important appointment. The doctor who listens to concerns without rushing. The fellow patient who shares an experience that helps someone feel understood.
Sometimes, gratitude is found in much smaller moments: a good cup of coffee, a phone call with a loved one, a beautiful afternoon or a day when symptoms are a little more manageable.
For patients, recognizing these moments doesn’t have to mean keeping a journal or following a daily routine. It can be as simple as pausing to appreciate something—or someone—that made the day a little easier.
At Bag It, we believe that having the right information can help patients feel more confident and involved in their care. Our Bag It Bags provide trusted educational materials, organizational tools, and practical resources to help individuals understand their diagnosis, prepare for appointments, communicate with their healthcare team, and navigate treatment and survivorship.
Having information in one place can help patients feel more prepared to ask questions and make informed decisions. And knowing where to turn for support can make a difference when everything feels unfamiliar.
Gratitude as a Caregiver and Family Member: Recognizing the People Behind the Care
When someone is diagnosed with cancer, their family and friends are impacted, too.
Caregivers often take on responsibilities they never anticipated. They may coordinate appointments, manage medications, research treatment options, provide transportation, help with daily activities, offer emotional support and try to keep everyday life moving forward.
They are often the people making sure everyone else is okay, even when they are struggling themselves.
For caregivers and family members, gratitude can be found in the connections that grow stronger, the moments shared together and the opportunity to be present for someone they love. It can also mean recognizing the people who step in to help, whether through a meal, a ride, a listening ear or simply offering to take something off their plate.
But caregivers need care, too.
It is easy for caregivers to put their own needs aside, particularly when a loved one is navigating treatment. Taking time to rest, asking others for help, connecting with fellow caregivers and recognizing personal limits are important parts of maintaining well-being.
If you are supporting someone with cancer, remember that you don’t have to do everything yourself. And if you know someone who is caring for a loved one, consider asking what would be most helpful. Sometimes the most meaningful expression of gratitude is recognizing the work someone is doing and making sure they feel supported, too.
Small Ways to Make Gratitude Part of the Cancer Experience
Gratitude doesn’t need to be complicated or time-consuming. Whether you are a patient, caregiver, family member or friend, here are a few simple ways to recognize the support and connection that can make a difference:
- Acknowledge the people who show up. Take a moment to thank a healthcare professional, caregiver, friend, or family member who has made a difference.
- Recognize the small moments. Notice the things that bring comfort, joy, laughter, or a sense of normalcy.
- Accept and offer help. Allowing others to support you is just as important as offering support to someone else.
- Stay connected. Reach out to someone who understands your experience or spend time with people who make you feel supported.
- Give yourself grace. Some days will be harder than others. You don’t have to find something positive in every situation.
- Share your appreciation. A handwritten note, a phone call, or a simple thank-you can mean more than you realize.
Finding Support and Resources Along the Way
Whether you are navigating a diagnosis, supporting a loved one, or helping someone through treatment and survivorship, having access to reliable information and support matters.
Bag It Cancer is proud to provide resources designed to support patients and caregivers throughout the cancer experience.
Explore these Bag It resources:
- The Bag It Bag – A collection of trusted cancer information, practical tools, and organizational resources to help patients become active members of their healthcare team.
- Bag It Cancer Resource Center – Explore educational materials and resources on topics ranging from caregivers and family support to treatment, side effects, financial assistance, survivorship, and more.
- Caregiver Resources – Find practical tips and information for supporting a loved one while navigating the responsibilities and challenges of caregiving.
Additional support from cancer-focused nonprofit organizations:
- Imerman Angels – Provides free, personalized, one-on-one peer support by connecting cancer patients, survivors, previvors, and caregivers with someone who has experienced a similar journey. Sometimes, talking with someone who truly understands can make all the difference.
- CanCare – Offers emotional support through personalized connections with cancer survivors and caregivers who have experienced similar challenges. CanCare also provides dedicated caregiver support and online support groups.
- Cancer Hope Network – Connects patients and caregivers with trained volunteer peer mentors who have firsthand experience with cancer. These personalized connections offer encouragement, understanding, and a reminder that no one has to face cancer alone.
This November, We Are Grateful for You
At Bag It Cancer, we know that cancer affects more than the person receiving a diagnosis. It touches families, friendships, communities and the people who dedicate themselves to making the cancer experience better for others.
We are grateful for every person who helps make our mission possible and for the opportunity to be part of a community that believes no one should have to navigate cancer without information and support.
Whether you are a patient, caregiver, family member, healthcare professional, advocate, donor or volunteer, your role matters.
This November, we encourage you to take a moment to recognize the people who have made a difference in your journey—and remember to include yourself among them.
Because gratitude isn’t about ignoring the hard parts of cancer. It’s about recognizing the support, compassion, and connection that help us through them.
From all of us at Bag It Cancer, thank you for being part of our community.
by Bag It Team | Feb 11, 2025 | Educational Articles
February 4th was World Cancer Day. The theme for 2025-2027 is United by Unique.
Each person’s story from diagnosis and beyond is different and each one matters! We receive different diagnoses, advice, treatment plans, drugs, surgeries, care, etc. But cancer is so much more than just a diagnosis.
We go through different emotions and at different paces. We learn so much about ourselves and those we care about. We discover how unique we truly are. Yet in our individuality, comes a kinship. Our story is ours, yet it will resonate with another’s heart.
We are extremely grateful to our Escape to THRIVE participants who were willing to share some of their stories that may touch your heart, may help you find something you’ve been missing, or may just be what you needed to hear to know that you are not alone.
Sharing Cancer Stories
It’s world cancer day today and I am so privileged to still be here while so many of my beautiful friends are not. Today I am so so lucky to be a stage 3C TNBC survivor because there were moments (shit there are still moments) where this crap is so heavy. Being diagnosed young and when you are supposed to be building a family, a home, a future sucks but I’m also thankful, I’m thankful for the compassion and desire to overcome what cancer has taught me. I’m thankful to the doctors and nurses and medicine that saved my life in 2021 so I can be here with no evidence of disease 4 years later. I’m thankful for the perspective cancer has given me not only on life but also death. Most of all I’m thankful for the community cancer helped form for me. A group of other compassionate, powerful, strong, intelligent humans all with this same crappy connection.
—Kimberly
This World Cancer Day I’m choosing to focus on the word grateful. That may seem odd when talking about a cancer diagnosis and, trust me, my heart has not filled with gratitude every day of this journey. I’ve had (and have) many days I look at the changes in my body and I wonder why this happened. But, as difficult as the journey has been at times, it has brought so much to be grateful for into my life.
I am grateful that my cancer was found early. I am grateful that I had an amazing team of doctors who worked together for the best outcomes possible. I am grateful for the family and friends that surrounded me and supported me throughout 7 surgeries and recoveries, especially my saint of a husband. I am grateful for the new friends I have gained in my life from joining a cancer group. And I am grateful for the opportunity I have to give back to those on this journey.
—Amy
This World Cancer Day, I focus on being. In a world full of doing, cancer was a wake up call for me to slow down and just be. Even when I had all the intention in the world to “do” my work continuing education credits during my month long surgery recovery, my body had other plans. I literally could do very little beyond look out the window. Even taking a walk was a momentous event. Slowly, my physical strength came back, and my spiritual and mind space expanded beyond where it had ever been before cancer. Cancer changed my life for the better (I can only say this many years into my thrivership).
I learned to:
- appreciate me for who I am, not the things that I do
- be graceful in accepting help (realizing it is a gift to give, and in order for someone to give help, someone must receive).
- slow down and not do everything everywhere all at once, especially for everyone else
- take time for myself
- advocate for myself and other cancer thrivers
- do the things that I enjoy, including retreats
- meditate
- be even more grateful
- savor each moment, even the challenging ones
- appreciate that growth comes from the seemingly hardest experiences
- heal with nature
Thank you to all of you who have shared in my journey. I am inspired by you. I appreciate you. I am grateful.
—Su-Yen
I see my life in 2 distinct halves: BC and AC—before cancer and after cancer.
I don’t even know that girl BC anymore. It’s as if she once existed and then she…didn’t. Maybe she died all at once while our body was in an icu bed, in a coma, tubes coming from her face, arms tethered, voiceless but wanting to scream, aware but not understanding, asleep but knowing even as she was being drugged into oblivion… Maybe she died little by little, piece by piece, as she lost body parts, left on operating room floors. Maybe she went mad and jumped off a building somewhere. No one noticed she was gone, except me. But I know. I know she’s dead and gone and I cannot deny that the me left in her place is brand new.
AC me has the wisdom that other me never grew old enough to attain. Expansiveness that other me could never begin to comprehend. She is more whole than she was before the mutinous body parts were cut away. She knows love like it’s a way of life. She drinks in experiences like they’re life-giving water. She knows her life purpose like it was tattooed on her soul.
She lives her life as if it is not a promise at all, but a blessing.
—Dawn
I was trained in journalism and beginning in 1984 became attracted to educating patients so they could be more in control of their care. That consumerism was new. In 1996 it became much more personal for me when I was diagnosed with leukemia. Other patients connected me with specialists far from my home and I entered a clinical trial that worked! That survival fueled even more passion to help inform patients and that has propelled me for decades. I feel the reason I survived was for this purpose and it is thrilling to see how better informed patients get better care.
I am 74 years old now and the blood cancer I have, myelofibrosis, is somewhat progressive. But I am NOT slowing down. We patients can help each other and I am delighted to be an active part of the cancer community and help amplify key information that is significant. I believe progress is real and we patients are integral to making it happen!
—Andrew
by Bag It Team | Dec 9, 2024 | Educational Articles
The holiday season can be exhausting for anyone, but cancer-related fatigue is a unique challenge. This type of fatigue goes beyond ordinary tiredness. It’s a deep, persistent fatigue or exhaustion that doesn’t improve with rest or sleep, often leaving you feeling unable to carry out your usual activities.
Cancer-related fatigue is a very common issue and can result from several factors, including:
- The cancer itself or other medical conditions.
- Treatments like chemotherapy, radiation, or surgery, and their side effects.
- Medications you’re taking.
- Changes in blood counts.
- Lifestyle factors, such as sleep disruptions, poor nutrition, or inadequate hydration.
- Emotional or mental health struggles, which fatigue can worsen.
You Don’t Have to Endure It Alone
Share your symptoms with your healthcare team so they can identify possible causes and suggest medical and non-medical treatments to help you.
Let loved ones know how you’re feeling—they often want to help but may not know how. Work together to adjust holiday traditions—whether it’s scaling back on celebrations, delegating or sharing tasks like decorating or cooking, or simplifying shopping. Focus on the activities that matter most to you and bring joy.
And yes, naps are absolutely allowed!
Self-Care Strategies for Cancer-Related Fatigue
These tips can help manage fatigue during the holidays and beyond:
- Set priorities. Choose manageable goals, establish routines, and let go of less important tasks. Don’t hesitate to ask for help.
- Balance activity and rest. While conserving energy is essential, staying physically active—even with gentle movement—can boost energy. Ask your healthcare team about safe exercise options.
- Take breaks. Schedule rest or relaxation time during the day, and don’t wait until you’re overtired.
- Improve sleep quality. Follow a bedtime routine to support better rest at night.
- Eat well and stay hydrated. Aim for a balanced diet. Meeting with a registered dietitian or nutritionist can help you to manage treatment side effects, maintain energy, address weight changes, and create tailored meal plans to support overall health and recovery.
- Care for your emotional health. Spend time with people who uplift you, and communicate your feelings—whether happy, sad, or tired. Alternatively, if you need solitude, it’s okay to set boundaries. You decide what feels right.
- Explore complementary therapies. Discuss with your healthcare provider options like acupuncture, massage, yoga, Tai Chi, Reiki, or stress-reduction techniques, which may help with fatigue or stress.
With thoughtful planning and support, it’s possible to navigate the holidays in a way that prioritizes your well-being and still allows you to enjoy what’s meaningful.
by Bag It Team | Nov 8, 2023 | Educational Articles
Palliative and hospice care provide similar, but different services for patients and their families that focus on a holistic approach and their quality of life.
Palliative care is a way to help people with serious illnesses feel better physically and emotionally, and it can start at any point in their illness. It works with other types of treatments that aim to cure the illness. By contrast, hospice care is a special kind of palliative care for those with less than six months to live, with a main focus on keeping them comfortable and emotionally-supported during that time.
Here are some important differences between these two kinds of care:
Palliative Care
- Aims to reduce pain and suffering in people with serious illnesses.
Read more from the National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization
- Can start at any stage of the illness, including at diagnosis, and can coexist with treatments, regardless of the person’s expected recovery.
- Can take place in various locations, including hospitals, clinics, or even at home.
- The intensity of medical treatment can vary widely, potentially including strong treatments.
- Often covered by health insurance and integrated into regular medical care.
Hospice Care
- Primarily for individuals with a short life expectancy, often six months or less and involves a team of experts.
- Main goal is to provide maximum comfort rather than aiming for a cure.
- Usually provided at the patient’s home, in a specialized hospice facility, or in a hospital.
- Typically begins when it becomes clear that treatments are not effective, focusing on the patient’s comfort in their final days or months.
- Emphasizes comfort and symptom management, often discontinuing aggressive treatments.
- Often covered by Medicare, Medicaid, or private insurance for eligible patients.
Both palliative care and hospice care provide comfort and support for patients, one throughout cancer or other illness, and the other as one approaches the end of life. Have a conversation with your doctor to figure out the kind of care that’s right for you and your unique situation, so you can live your best life.
Don’t Wait! Bag It Bag and online resources are able to provide ways to empower patients and their families to ask for these services (palliative and hospice care) to improve the quality of life of patients and their families. Order a Bag and explore our Cancer Resource Center.
Additional Resources
November is a time when gratitude often takes center stage. But when cancer touches your life, thankfulness can take on a much deeper and sometimes more complicated meaning.
Gratitude in Action: The People Who Make a Difference
When someone is diagnosed with cancer, their family and friends are impacted, too.
Recent Comments