Hey there! I’m Maddie, and welcome to my first ever blog post!
This is a thing I’ve been considering for a long time. A looooong time. I think a lot, and have a lot of thoughts, and sometimes I think my friends and family might get bored of my same old ramblings all the time (but like, who could?!), and then I think ‘oh I know I’ll write all my thoughts down’. I tried writing in a diary, but after a few months I found it too stressful. I feel like writing my thoughts down in a blog, where I can type them, make them look pretty, - and I doubt many people will read them, probably - could be more fun.
I also like the idea of having some kind of a platform to spread awareness of certain important topics.
I am a 3rd year student, currently on my year abroad in Rome, studying Classics. I play the piano, ukulele, and I do like to sing sometimes, if you catch me in the right moment. I love exploring, travelling, trying new things - especially food. I am obsessed with food. All kinds of food, in fact I have an entire Instagram page dedicated to it. Food is just so versatile, causes so many emotions, can be social or completely private, can be so vibrant or completely dull. It’s great. Probably my favourite thing. I’m quite a family and friends-oriented person, and although (I think) it takes me a while to get close to people, the ones I am close to are incredibly important to me, they’re pretty much all I care about in my life. Those are just some facts about me, but really I’m still trying to work myself out. Apparently I’m an ENFP personality type (although now verging more on the I side of the E), but I’m only 20, so I like to think I’ve got time to fully work out who I am, why I think and feel certain things, what I’m doing. I’ve got time, right?
When I was 18, in January 2016, I was diagnosed with ASPS, Alveolar Soft Part Sarcoma. It’s a type of cancer, that develops in your soft tissue and is most common in younger people, but is very very rare. Put in terms of percentages, Sarcoma in general takes up only 10% of all cancers and ASPS is just 0.2-1% of soft tissue sarcomas (not even all sarcomas!!) so like a tiny weeny amount (statistics are confusing, right?). Moreover, the amount of teenagers and young adults that are diagnosed with cancer each year, by my calculations, is only 0.7% of all cancer diagnoses in the UK (according to CancerResearchUK statistics). There are over 100 different types of cancer, that’s what the doctor told me when he diagnosed me. I like to think that actually there are way more than that, as I’m discovering more and more that every single case of cancer is absolutely unique. I am still living with ASPS, and I want this blog to be a space where I can talk about that, (as I think my Facebook pals are getting bored of my constant cancer awareness posts) - it can be for people who have a genuine interest. I have only found one single forum about my type of cancer, grasping for information about it online is near to impossible, so I hope that anyone else with it may stumble across this and be comforted in some way.
I want this blog to be light-hearted and fun, for me and for any potential readers. I want it to be an informative space, but also one where I can just spill my heart out, my thoughts, and maybe make a couple posts about food because, you know, why should I limit my passions? My next few posts will probably be more introductory ones about me, my experiences with cancer, but you know if the fancy takes me I might put a recipe up. Who knows.
See you next time. M x