linnea

I have lived with lung cancer since 2005. On this "Giving Tuesday," I ask that you join me in making an end-of-year donation to an organization that truly deserves it, the Global Resource for Advancing Cancer Education (GRACE).

I was diagnosed with non-small cell lung cancer in April 2005. I was only 45 years old, I had never smoked, and I thought lung cancer wasn’t something I would ever have to worry about. Now I know that upward of 15 percent of lung cancer patients are never smokers.

Three years after my initial diagnosis, doctors discovered I had the ALK mutation. I had no idea what that meant or that I would even still be talking about it in 2014. In fact, I was seeing a psychologist to prepare for my death.