Auto news on Youtube Sep 28 2018

Hi this is Melanie from Girls Rocking Cancer

this week I want to share an embarrassing story

as part of my "I'm not ashamed series"

this week I want to talk about

"I'm not ashamed: what dating after cancer really looks like"

my story takes place a few years back

I married quite young

so when I hit my thirties and I separated from my husband

I found myself in a new city

I moved to Sydney Australia I had no friends, no family, no lover

and that's where I got diagnosed with cervical cancer

so after I was released from the hospital

really soon after I was released from hospital

I had to be connected to a leg bag so I just call it a "bag of pee" basically

and that's what I thought that maybe I should get back out there into dating

the story was that after they did a trachelectomy on me they pushed the bladder

so they were not sure if there was going to be permanent or temporary nerve damage but

they said probably permanent damage

so I wasn't sure of what dating would look like

they said oh you know don't worry about it

you can obviously date someone and you can have sex no problem

but I found quite difficult to even walk with this

so for the first time in my life

going back into dating which I didn't know what dating would look like

I jumped online and did online dating for the first time

I met someone and he asked me on a date

and then I was just back at home and I even didn't know

what to wear to be hiding my leg bag

I went shopping so I got myself a little dress

and I did a little bit of makeup and

I thought I looked half decent

but bear with me this was a Sunday afternoon

so a beautiful Sunday afternoon in Milsons Point in Sydney

the sun was shining through

for me it was going to be quite casual

so when I turned the corner

because we were going to meet in a cafe

because I didn't know what this guy was going to be

maybe he was a serial killer I didn't know

so then I decided to to meet in a cafe

so I went to see him he was wearing a suit

I was already feeling very self-conscious obviously

not sure what was happening

in my head it was going to be quite a casual date

and I saw him in a suit

so anyways I went with it the date unfolded

and then we ended up in a restaurant

so as we talked and everything

he puts his hand on to my lap

I thought oh no

all I could think about was oh my god

Dear God please make sure he doesn't touch my bag of pee

it was really embarrassing and that's what dating after gynaecological cancer felt like for me

because I think we can feel quite self-conscious after cancer treatment

what I decided to do this week

is write a blog about a few tips

if you are going back out there after gynaecological cancer or

after cancer in general how to go about it

I think the first tip is love yourself first

so I think you know we cannot expect someone else to love us

if we don't love ourselves first

so I think the tip with that is think about what you can bring to a partner

if you even find it a little bit challenging

you can ask three or five people that are close to you that you know love you

and are safe people to go to

ask them to come up with a list of three favourite things

that they love about you and maybe start there

consider what you want in a partner

I think rather than just think about

oh my god I hope he likes me

think about what you want in a partner

because this is a two-way street

so I think that's a good way to start when you are thinking about dating

the third one is realise that obviously you've been going through cancer treatment

so it's completely normal if you're feeling different in your body

so you may want to get some help and some support

to go through with it because maybe you're feeling different

so don't hesitate to get some support and

obviously as part of the Girls Rocking Cancer community

I'm going to talk about that a fair bit and hopefully

we can start having more conversations about these things

my PhD is on gynaecological cancer recovery

so I look at how women feel in their body after cancer

and intimacy and relationships

stay connected to our little community for support

please just know when you want to have the talk

different people will want to bring the whole cancer thing

at different stage in the dating process

I'm quite a what-you-see-is-what-you-get kind of girl

I like to bring things up quite early maybe after two or three dates

but some of us might feel like we want to be more comfortable

and get to know the person a little bit more

I know our gynaecological cancer ambassador this week

the beautiful Yohanna

who you would seen on our wall for Teal Tuesday

she said I don't want cancer to define me or to own me

the power is to me not cancer

and I really like that message so if you feel that

you don't want cancer to be part of your story right at the beginning

it's completely okay

another tip I have is maybe have a practice run with someone that you trust

so I have a handful of friends in my life that I really trust

to be really raw, open and honest with

so you can talk to one of your friends

to simulate what that talk could look like

and that might help you to go through with it

so these are just some tips

I'm going to put a blog together on girlsrockingcancer.com

but in the meantime I hope that this little video made you smile

all the best xoxo