She shares her experiences with cancer and comedy as this comedian helps us to see that they stories we tell can bring both healing and laughter.

Find out more about Joey at joeythelady.com and you can find her on Instagram here: @joeythelady

Here is some background on the founders: Bob Guz and Jen Richardson, the Austin Ukulele Society’s co-founders, warmly invite you to join the fun! Come play music, make new friends, learn new songs and strums, and have a great time. Together with the indispensable input of Lyda Guz, Lori Merlino, Jodi Cadle, and Jana Israel, Bob and Jen lead the organization. This advisory committee meets monthly to manage all business logistics.

And here is their awesome YouTube channel:  YouTube Channel.

Nick Canedo the Vice President of Community Engagement at We Are Blood (https://weareblood.org/donate-blood/) joins us to talk about the good work that this non-profit does in our area here in Central Texas. He also gives us a helpful hint that we can find a place to donate blood in our area by searching at https://donatingblood.org. Many cancer patients are alive today because of blood donors.

Andrea Wilson Woods is a patient advocate, speaker, podcaster, and author.

In 2002, Andrea founded Blue Faery: The Adrienne Wilson Liver Cancer Association after losing her 15-year-old sister Adrienne, whom she raised for seven years, to stage IV liver cancer. As a patient advocate, Andrea has served on many committees and advisory boards, including NCI’s Hepatobiliary Task Force, Target Pharma Solutions HCC Advisory Board, ASCO’s Systemic Therapy for Advanced Hepatocellular Carcinoma Guideline Panel, Mayo Clinic Hepatobiliary SPORE, and the DOD Peer Reviewed Cancer Research Program. Andrea represents Blue Faery as a member of AASLD, ASCO, Deadliest Cancers Coalition, and GI Cancers Alliance. Currently, Andrea is the only American serving on the Canadian Cancer Survivor Network’s Liver Cancer Advisory Council.

Andrea has received numerous scholarships to attend conferences around the country to tell her story, increase her knowledge, advocate for more funding, and continue her professional development. Organizations that have granted scholarships/sponsorships include Academy Health, American Association for Cancer Research, American Society of Clinical Oncology, American Liver Foundation, Caring Ambassadors, Conquer Cancer Foundation, National Comprehensive Cancer Network, National Viral Hepatitis Roundtable, and more.

Andrea is cited as a co-author of many academic articles about hepatocellular carcinoma. In 2017, Andrea debuted her podcast Better Off Bald. Better Off Bald is based on Andrea’s story about raising and losing her sister to liver cancer. In October 2019, Andrea published her medical memoir titled Better Off Bald: A Life in 147 Days. It became a #1 Bestseller on Amazon in multiple categories and has won many awards.

Andrea obtained her master’s degree in writing from the University of Southern California, where she focused on non-fiction. She loves telling and writing stories. Her nonfiction writing has won many national awards. As an adjunct professor for Kaplan University, she taught a writing skills and strategies class to incoming freshman students. As a graduate TA, Andrea worked with more than 100 undergraduate students with the goal of improving all aspects of their writing.

Before focusing on her graduate studies, Andrea worked as a development writer and editor for USC’s School of Cinematic Arts. As a family service specialist at the Mattel Children’s Hospital at UCLA, she facilitated women’s groups in the Legacy for Children research study sponsored by the Centers for Disease Control and managed by the Research Triangle Institute. Additionally, Andrea worked as a social media manager for the nation’s largest wine importer.

During the seven years she raised her sister, Andrea worked as a primary and secondary school teacher, and she acted in film, television, and theatre. Andrea received her certification in fundraising with a focus on institutional development from UCLA Extension. Andrea is also an ICF Associate Certified Coach and a 500-Hour Certified Yoga Teacher. She graduated cum laude from USC with a B.A. in humanities. After graduation, Andrea gained custody of her then-eight-year-old sister Adrienne.

Raising Adrienne has been Andrea’s greatest joy in life; losing Adrienne to liver cancer has been her greatest loss. Andrea started Blue Faery because she doesn’t want another person to lose a loved one to HCC, and she wants the world to know Adrienne’s spirit, strength, and courage.

Joe Bullock was diagnosed with stage 3b colorectal cancer in May 2018 after a routine colonoscopy at age 50. Despite experiencing symptoms for several months, he delayed seeking medical attention while grieving the loss of both his parents, who passed away within six months of each other in 2017. After this period of mourning, Joe underwent a colonoscopy at Duke Hospital, where his gastroenterologist discovered two polyps and a 10cm tumor in his colon.

Following the diagnosis, Joe underwent surgery to remove the tumor, during which his colon was reconnected, and 40 lymph nodes were removed—three of which tested positive for cancer. Post-surgery, he underwent an intensive treatment regimen consisting of Oxaliplatin infusions and Xeloda pills over the course of eight cycles, spanning six months.

In February 2019, Joe was declared NED (No Evidence of Disease). Since surviving cancer, he has embraced a mission to give back, driven by the belief that while cancer may be done with him, he is not done with cancer. His involvement with the Man Up to Cancer community has allowed him to transform his pain into purpose, offering hope and solidarity to others navigating similar journeys.

I have made a will using their tool which was very easy and pretty thorough. To find that resource click here: https://inheritanceofhope.org/wills

Jackie Herigodt (she/her) started with IA in 2012 and has been a caregiver to several loved ones with cancer, including her mother, who lost her battle with lung cancer in 2004, which helps fuel her passion.

In her current role as Director of Partnerships and Engagement, Jackie oversees the Mentor Angel training process, the matches made between Mentor Angels and support seekers and the organization’s outreach efforts. Jackie was responsible for the creation of the outreach initiative and has helped strengthen partnerships with other cancer organizations and cancer centers to better serve more people who have been impacted by cancer.

Jackie graduated from Northeastern Illinois University with a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology. She has worked in the fields of animal training, customer service and education, which has proven beneficial in her current role. 

Gloria, a social worker, cancerworld caregiver and friend shares her experience staying at the Hope Lodge facility in Houston, TX.

https://podcasthon.org

Rev. Dr. Anna Blaedel is co-founder and co-director at enfleshed. For the first five years of enfleshed, Anna served as theologian-in-residence. They bring an attentiveness to the intersections of spiritual, academic, and activist engagement. Through enfleshed’s “moments for common nourishment,” a bi-monthly column, they bridge the forefront of religious scholarship and a passion for reimagining our ordinary, common, messy life as the site of Divine unfolding. Building on their study of theopoetics, relational philosophies of enfleshment, and anti-racist, feminist, queer and eco-theologies of liberation, once a month they will offer words for a sustaining, grounding, and enlivening spirituality in our current context.

Anna chaplains college students in Iowa City through sacred collective: a place of belonging for spiritual misfits, and recently completed a PhD in Theological and Philosophical Studies at Drew University’s Graduate Division on Religion. Anna’s dissertation is titled, “Sacred Enfleshments: A Queer Theopoetics of Collective Liberation.” Waking before dawn, lingering in poetry…, being an aunt, retreating to the woods or their basement woodshop, tending the garden, sharing silence, and feeding people delicious food are some of Anna’s favorite things.

You can find out more about the Colorectal Cancer Alliance and their goal to end colon cancer coast to coast at: https://colorectalcancer.org

The Colorectal Cancer Alliance has been helping us advocate, educate, and has facilitated testing to save lives since 1999.

www.driveaseniornorthwest.org with our time, talent, encouragement and donations.

If you want to contact us you can reach us at notesfromcancerworld@gmail.com.

If you want to contact us you can reach us at notesfromcancerworld@gmail.com.

Wonders and Worries is a non-profit that offers free community based services to children whose parents are experiencing cancer. One of the things they provide is counseling for children whose parent is experiencing cancer with licensed professional counselors. They also partner with other organizations, like kesem.org, to provide more robust programs throughout the United States. You can find more information at wondersandworries.org. In this episode we also mention kesem.org one of the organizations that Wonders and Worries partners with to do good in the world.

If you want to contact us you can reach us at notesfromcancerworld@gmail.com.

As always, you can get more information about the podcast at www.notesfromcancerworld.org and we can be contacted at notesfromcancerworld@gmail.com

Season 1 Episode 3 - Advocating

Season 1 Episode 4 - Boundaries

Season 1 Episode 6 - Energy

Season 1 Episode 11 - Hospice

Season 1 Episode 12 - Kesem (especially if you have kids)

Season 2 Episode 1 - Hydration

Season 2 Episode 2 - Hope Lodge

Season 2 Episode 6 - Social Work

Season 2 Episode 14 - Triage Cancer

Season 3 Episode 12 - Doctors

Trigger warning: all of our episodes talk about hard things. In this episode we talk specifically about suicide.

Other helpful support sites include: ecpc.org the European Cancer Support Coalition and the Asian American Cancer Support Network (aacns.org).

See him on Instagram @rahpowerfitness

Find out more about Camp Kesem at:  www.kesem.org

https://www.divergepsychotherapy.com

Rev JD Herrera is Vice President for Enrollment Management at Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary (https://www.austinseminary.edu), an ordained elder in the United Methodist Church, the husband of the Rev. Abigail Herrera and a great dad to three children.