Brianna Miller is a 22-year-old from Southern California who was diagnosed with Stage 2 Hodgkin lymphoma shortly before her 21st birthday. She is a patient at CHOC. In this five-part series, she takes Kids Health readers along on her look back at her journey with cancer.
Hi, my name is Brianna Miller, known to my friends and family as Bri! I am a 22-year old patient at the Hyundai Cancer Institute at CHOC, being treated for Hodgkin’s Lymphoma. A month before my 21st birthday, and just before my senior year of college, I was diagnosed with cancer. To say that learning I had cancer was a shock is an understatement. Throughout the last few months of treatment I’ve had a lot of time for contemplation and for trying to make sense of my emotions concerning my journey with cancer.
You’ve probably heard about the five stages of grief, which are typically applied to people experiencing the loss of a loved one, but I found these stages to be therapeutic in learning about and coping with my diagnosis. When you are diagnosed with cancer as a young adult, you are most likely experiencing one of the biggest losses of your life to date.
State 1: Denial
As a full-time college student working two jobs and being involved in a sorority, I was very busy and frankly not worried about much other than my grades, my friends and showing up to work on time. I had no symptoms other than swollen lymph nodes in my neck, and honestly, you don’t often hear about the young adult side of cancer all that much. It took four months of testing and multiple biopsies to assign a diagnosis, but I don’t think I ever really took seriously the possibility of cancer. Seeing as how I had no painful or otherwise debilitating symptoms, finding out what was wrong with my body was pushed to the back of my mind in favor of more present issues, such as my classes, work and social life. When I was finally diagnosed, my reaction was subdued because it almost felt as if I’d known in the back of my mind for a while and had been denying the reality because I didn’t want this disruption in my life.
Stage 2: Anger
Once the reality of my diagnosis set in, a sense of anger also set in. The hardest part about being diagnosed with cancer is that there is really no one to be angry at. The cause of Hodgkin’s is still unknown, so I couldn’t be mad at myself or at anything for causing it. I carried a lot of anger with me for quite a few weeks, and this anger hasn’t quite subsided. It rises to the surface occasionally when I am having a particularly bad day, when I receive bad news about scans, or sometimes just randomly when I am lying in bed trying to fall asleep. Quite often, this anger stems from the question of “why me?” Sometimes I think this anger could be relieved if there was a definitive cause of this cancer, so that it could take away the sense of unfairness that I feel.
Stage 3: Bargaining
The bargaining stage is associated with “If only…” statements and imagining how different things might be if only you personally had done something differently. I have reflected quite a few times on my lengthy process to diagnosis. Five months passed from when my enlarged lymph nodes first popped up to the beginning of my treatment, at which point the tumor in my chest had grown to 9.3 cm. At my halfway scans, there was unexpectedly still active cancer cells in my chest, resulting in more cycles of chemo being added to my treatment plan. I sometimes wonder if things would be different if I had been diagnosed earlier. If my tumor had been smaller at the beginning of treatment, would I have responded better to my chemo? If I had been diagnosed earlier, would I have been able to start treatment earlier and been able to return to school on time, rather than having to withdraw for a semester? Of course, there’s no point in lingering on these thoughts, but these are some unanswerable questions that I can’t help but think about occasionally, and I’m sure apply to many other cancer patients.
Stage 4: Sadness and depression
When addressing this stage, it is important to distinguish between sadness and depression. Depression is pervasive and interferes with everyday activities, and recovery can require professional help. Personally, I felt a deep, deep sadness but it never crossed the threshold into depression. It’s normal to be deeply sad about a cancer diagnosis, especially as a young adult. If I start to count the number of things that I will be missing out on during my six months of treatment, I’ll definitely run out of fingers and be broken down in tears by the end of it. For me, the hardest thing to cope with is that I had to move home to California for treatment, leaving my college time that was filled with a lot of family members, most all of my friends, and my sense of home. It’s hard not to be sad when your life and everything you know is 1,500 miles away, and just like that you’ve lost all sense of normalcy. Going through treatment for cancer doesn’t help either, as it’s hard to be cheerful while being nauseous, fatigued, and in pain from any number of side effects. The most that I can do is look for something positive in everything, and know that at the end of these six months this will all be a memory. Something that has really helped me during this time and while experiencing these feelings is keeping in touch with all of my friends, even while so far away. Knowing that they are all just a quick call or Facetime away has been so reassuring. Kara, one of CHOC’s child life specialists, has been so uplifting every time she’s visited and talked to me too, reassuring me that this is all temporary and offering me all of the resources I might need.
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Stage 5: Acceptance
Acceptance by no means is defined by letting go of or losing any of the normal emotions that come with a cancer diagnosis. Acceptance, for me, simply means that you have made peace with your diagnosis and are ready to put all your energy towards fighting the disease. There came a point where I realized that constantly being angry and sad was doing nothing but making me more upset. I realized that in order to beat cancer I was going to need to be strong and accept this as my new (temporary) normal. This doesn’t mean I no longer experience those feelings of sadness, anger, and confusion, but they have become temporary moments rather than a persistent mood.
Everyone’s journey with cancer is different. Even if you are diagnosed with the same type of cancer as someone you know, your emotions, questions and concerns may be completely different, and that’s ok. Having cancer is a deeply personal experience, but that doesn’t mean you have to fight it alone. Talk to your parents, siblings, friends, doctors and nurses― they are all there to help and support you in any way they can. No matter what emotions a cancer diagnosis brings you, don’t feel alone.
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Learn more about the Hyundai Cancer Center at CHOC
CHOC Hospital was named one of the nation’s best children’s hospitals by U.S. News & World Report in its 2023-24 Best Children’s Hospitals rankings and ranked in the cancer specialty.
Learn more at choc.org
Read more from Brianna
What it’s Like to be Treated at a Children’s Hospital as a Young Adult
Confidence and Cancer: How Cancer Changed the Way I Think
Finding Humor in Cancer
Finding Someone Who “Gets It”
