She’ll never get to walk down an aisle with a flowing wedding dress or have her father take her to the floor to dance. She won’t be able to comfort her parent’s when she’s gone, and she’s scared, but mostly she’s scared for them. Terrified that her mother won’t be a mother anymore, and scared her dad will stare at the walls for countless hours a day. She’s in pain. But humans don’t like pain, however, they still deal with it.

*spoiler alert for ‘the fault in our stars’ -John Green

i’ve never seen a love that hurts so much. when both people are going through pain, but yet they are able to support each other. and life sucks… it really does. Certain things happen to certain people, and there’s nothing we can do about it, except live on. Life gives you hope and then just as quickly take it away. While watching the fault in our stars, I cried, I bawled, I couldn’t breathe. Because I know how it’s like to be like Hazel Grace. I know well enough how it feels to not be able to breathe, and have myself drowning in my own lungs. It’s painful, and having something hit so close to me, really broke me inside. I got better, it wasn’t cancer, but something like cancer is spontaneous. Sometimes it gives mercy, and other times, it’s a bitch. As I saw chest tubes being inserted into her, I was like girl, I legit feel your pain. And to be honest, when I got chest tubes poked in me, it was one of the most painful things as I was awake the first time, and yet just the same, I was asked by doctors to rate my pain from 1-10. And that damn scale! I was asked tons of times that it made me want to puke. I never said 10, because just like Hazel Grace, I’m keeping that 10 later. Folding it up and storing it away, until the right moment comes. Because there will be a day, when I believe that physical pain will give way to emotional pain. Just like when August dies.

Watching other people grieve is devastating. Just try imagining what it’s like… As I was watching the movie, I was like this is why I want to be a pediatric oncologist, to change cancer patient’s lives.. but there’s so much more to it. Cancer hits anyone at anytime. Babies, children, and teenagers alike were dying going through pain that I might never get to meet in my lifetime, and they’re dying. They’re slowly dying, with their loved ones dying. And not once did I cry for Hazel or August because they were strong. I cried for their parents, because being a sister, I can’t imagine what it would be like to lose somebody that’s my little baby. Even though through all my pain, I only cried once at the hospital. Perhaps, it was a bit of self pity but for the most part, I thought I was going to die, and I realized how much my family and friends cared about me. It finally hit me, how much I meant to them, and the pain that I would cause them if I did die. I cried because how is it like to watch your own child learn how to talk, then walk, then go to school, but you never get to seem the graduate or lead a normal life like others. How does it feel to be helpless? How does it feel to have the person you most love, the person that you would die for, lie in your arms, and you can’t do anything to help them? I cried. I’m not going to use fancy vocab words to describe my state of crying, but I wept and sniffled. There were times when my parents got sick and times that I was very close to dying. And all these moments are like light bulbs flashing in my brain like a warning sign.

Appreciate the people around you. Don’t get caught up in how much time you have left, but how much time you still have. Be brave. Be the one that they want you to be, be their support because they can’t be strong enough to brace two people. Suck it in, take a deep breath. Time can cut anywhere, it can be tomorrow, in a few years, or the next seconds. But just know, even though no matter how long the time was, it always seems short. But just because the times short, doesn’t mean it wasn’t anything. It counts, you count, they count.

When I realized how much Gus wanted to leave a mark on the world, I finally knew what I wanted to do. I don’t live for myself, I live for others. But I understand that I’m going to live for others through me. The things many people can’t do, I’m going to do it for them. It isn’t fair that certain people will never get to do the things they want or help make the world a better place because they can’t. It hurts in many ways. So please use your talents to help others out. You shouldn’t always do things for yourself, but do some  things for others.

I know how it feels to be the one who feels helpless but also the person who feels so sorry of putting the ones they love in situations like these. Each side is painful, and no one has it easy. If you are grieving or just want to talk, please feel free to contact me. I want to make a change, we shouldn’t let something like cancer get in the way of so many lives. It’s time to stop it.