Experience Project is launching a new online cancer support network , The Cancer Support Project, on October 1st, 2007.

Experience Project is built around dynamic groups of users who come onto the platform, share narratives and personal stories about their life experiences, and then connect with others who are going through the same experiences. Experience Project will never ask for your name; you can keep your identity completely private while meeting new friends who can understand you.

The central goal of The Cancer Support Project is to provide a hub for emotional and psychological support for all experiences involving cancer, including experiences as a survivor or a caregiver, something that is not currently widely addressed as many sites focus on sharing information regarding therapies. The Experience Project will also be launching a Facebook application within The Cancer Support Project to enable people to show their support and raise cancer awareness via Facebook, MySpace, blogs and web pages.

The Cancer Support Project will be launching on October 1st, but you can check it out now. I know I will be checking it out for sure! The Cancer Support Project is located here.

How are children surviving cancer today? Better than ever before. Some childhood cancer patients, now in their young adult years, are expecting to reach milestones in their lives others before them never would have reached.

Today, 1 in 1,000 young adults in the United States is a childhood cancer survivor. In the 1970s, the chance a child would outlive leukemia or lymphoma was 25 percent. Today, it's 80 percent. That's better than most adult recovery rates.

As recovery rates rise, a new frontier is on the horizon -- follow-up for these young people as they age. You see, the very treatments that saved these individuals may cause them complications later in life. It's not yet clear what happens when kids live 20 to 30 years beyond diagnosis. But teams at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital in Memphis, Tennessee, plan to find out as they launch one of the most ambitious follow-up programs to date. Contacting 5,000 patients who have survived for more than 10 years, doctors hope they will recruit a group to receive free check-ups for life. They'll also receive blood tests, MRI scans, even fertility counseling. Their medical histories will serve as rich textbooks for medical professionals and future patients -- so the war on childhood cancer can continue.

This Chicago Cubs will honour breast cancer patients in their September 22nd game against the Pittsburgh Pirates, CNN has reported. It's all part of the National City Real Men Wear Pink campaign, of which legendary player Ryne Sandberg is a spokesperson for. The game will feature real breast cancer survivors from the Chicagoland area, though unfortunately, nominations for survivors were only accepted until September 1.

I think it's awesome that the men involved with sports teams are getting involved in the fight against breast cancer. It might be a disease limited to females but it's something that affects everyone in one way or another.

Jill Sklar was diagnosed with Crohn's disease, a debilitating gastrointestinal condition, when she was twenty. Jill set out to investigate how others who have survived the diagnosis and treatment of a chronic life altering illness perceived themselves -- and the effect of that illness on their life.

The Five Gifts of Illness: A Reconsideration is the result of Jill's investigation. She interviewed over one hundred individuals who had suffered a wide variety of illnesses. Sklar discovered that five gifts emerged as common denominators among the survivors. Those five gifts form the heart of this book.

You can purchase the book on amazon.com.

I was trained months ago to serve as a Reach to Recovery volunteer for the American Cancer Society (ACS). My purpose: to meet face-to-face with women facing breast cancer, to offer them some measure of comfort, to help them manage their overwhelming emotions, to provide them with information and resources, to impart hope during a time of fear and uncertainty.

For months, I had not been called upon to meet with anyone in my community. I'd like to think this is a good thing -- a sign of decreasing breast cancer cases perhaps -- but I tend to believe it stems from a hesitancy to ask for help or a lack of knowledge about this support program. Regardless, I got my first call last week. And I made my first visit. And these are my first impressions of my first encounter as a Reach to Recovery volunteer.

The Reach to Recovery program operates on the premise of matching like-cancer survivors. I was matched with a young woman -- she is 31; I am 37, although my diagnosis came at age 34 -- and each of us was diagnosed with early stage breast cancer. We both had surgery, both have young children, both feel a little sad that because of cancer, we likely won't have more children. We connected. We bonded. For a little more than one hour, we were in the same boat. Together, we tackled rough waters.

Marcia, the creator of MyLifeLine, has a dream: To make a difference in the lives of cancer patients and their families. A cancer survivor herself, she understands what it means to be diagnosed, undergo treatments -- and still be present and available to the questions of concerned family members and friends.

At age 27, Marcia was diagnosed with stage III ovarian cancer. To say it was unexpected is an understatement of vast proportions! At the time of the diagnosis, she was living in Chicago and working as a flight attendant for American Airlines. She went from flying the friendly skies to a complete hysterectomy, followed by 6 months of chemotherapy. One clear memory is the spiritual support she received from family and friends. "For that I am eternally grateful," she says.

MyLifeLine.org is a nonprofit organization that encourages cancer patients and survivors to create free, customized websites. Their mission is to empower patients to build an online support community of family and friends to foster connection, inspiration, and healing.

C is for Cupid is a dating service for people whose lives have been affected by cancer. Founded by survivors, their goal is to provide a comfortable and confidential environment for members to connect with compatible singles and friends.

How does it work?

Registered members make a profile that can be viewed by other members and you can browse other member's profiles and chose to communicate through a private mailbox on the website. When you have a message C is for Cupid will send a notice to your registered email that you have mail.

Your email and personal information remains confidential unless you choose to share it. Only those who have registered and have been approved can fully participate in the website.

To learn more about C is for Cupid and read some frequently asked questions go here.

Older cancer survivors, those between 55 and 65 years old, who remain cancer-free for two to six years after a diagnosis, are as likely to be working as their colleagues who have not had cancer, according to a new study published in the Health Service Research Journal.

However, people who have received a recent diagnosis of cancer are less likely to be working.

According to the lead author, Pamela Farley Short of Pennsylvania State University, "It's mostly good news. Once you get through the treatment, then, generally speaking, you can look forward to being productive and expect that your career will not be affected." In addition, Short adds that, for employers, "there is every reason to believe that survivors will continue to be productive workers and will stick with their employer."

Jimmie Holland, M.D., a psychiatrist at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, commented on the results, "It looks as if the stigma of having cancer has been diminished and workers will be allowed to work if they're physically able. It's a win-win situation."

Last year, on July 14th, I took the day off work to get a tattoo of my dad's initials on my wrist. Today, on July 14th, I will make breakfast, go to the gym, try to get some work done and have dinner with my family. But the significance of the day won't be lost on me. It was 2 years ago today that I watched my dad take his final breath, losing his short battle with cancer. It's an awful thing to see -- watching someone wheezing, struggling to get air, then finally giving up -- and I had nightmares about that for so long, nightmares in which I was the one struggling to breathe. The last time I saw my dad alive, we were fighting -- he, trying to take off his oxygen mask because it was pinching his nose; I, forcing it back on, forcing him to breathe, for my sake more than his own. And when it was over, I thought my life was over. I was certain I would never laugh again.

I took grief counselling after my loss, and the counsellor told me that days like this would be hard -- these anniversaries of tragedy. And they are but on this particular day, I don't like to dwell. I'd rather celebrate the anniversary of his birth than the mourn the day of his death. But the memories are more fresh than usual.

If there's one thing I want to get across here, it's this: Fathers, mothers, husbands, wives -- take care of your health. You owe it to those who love you . Visit your doctor. Insist on taking the tests. Buy yourself that extra time with your family. Do it for them, the ones who will be left behind.

My friend and fellow young breast cancer survivor has received a great honor to serve as one of the 55 delegates representing breast cancer advocates worldwide at Ignite the Promise: Global Advocate Summit in Hungary.

I'm so proud of you Deb!

This press release says it all:

Deb Kirkland, of Baltimore, MD, has been selected to serve as one of 55 delegates representing breast cancer advocates worldwide at "Ignite the Promise: Global Advocate Summit" in Budapest, Hungary, Sept. 29-30, 2007.

Organized by Susan G. Komen for the Cure, the world's largest grassroots network of breast cancer survivors and activists, the summit will pair the 25 U.S. breast cancer advocates with their counterparts from 30 countries. The overarching goals for holding this international summit are to elevate the dialogue on breast cancer's global impact and to share strategies used to combat breast cancer in the delegates' local communities

"Each year, more than 1 million women worldwide receive a breast cancer diagnosis," said Nancy G. Brinker, founder of Susan G. Komen for the Cure. "The need to provide these women-regardless of race, nationality, or socioeconomic status-an equal opportunity to beat a breast cancer diagnosis has never been greater. This summit will enable advocates to share outreach tactics that have been implemented in the U.S. and elsewhere to meet our collective goal of saving lives and ending breast cancer forever."

As if being involved in the 9/11 attack on the World Trade Centers wasn't horrific enough, it's now appearing as if people present at the WTC on that world-changing day have higher than normal rates of lymphatic and blood cancers, as reported on our sister site, That's Fit. This comes as a particularly harsh blow, since it's also been shown that 70% of this group also suffers from respiratory illnesses. But the true impact of this correlation won't be evident for years to come, when the disease may become present in many not currently affected.

I can't help but be reminded of the aftermath of the bombings on Hiroshima and Nagasaki during WWII, when what was at first a tragedy of epic proportions was made by the realization that people would continue to suffer the effects for many years to come.

The world is such a cruel, unfair place sometimes.

Glioblastoma Multiforme (GBM), also known as a grade IV astrocytoma, is the most common and most aggressive type of primary brain tumor. Although GBM can occur at any age, the disease is most commonly diagnosed after the age of 50.

I wanted to discuss this type of cancer and add it to the Cancer by the Numbers feature because it has directly affected my family. My 39-year-old uncle died of the disease in 1987. He only survived a year after diagnosis. It is disheartening that this disease has not seen any strides in improved survival rates over all these years.

The Numbers

GBM accounts for 52 percent of all primary brain tumor cases. Brain tumors account for one in every 100 cancers diagnosed annually in the United States. Most malignant brain tumors and brain cancers have spread from other tumors in the body to the skull, including cancers of the breast and lung, malignant melanoma and blood cell cancers.

Norwegian researchers report that about 68 percent of patients who wish to have children manage to do so after successful treatment of Hodgkin's lymphoma.

The researchers studied both men and women survivors. They found that the type of treatment was significantly associated with successful parenthood. The highest probability was in patients treated with radiation only or with less damaging types of chemotherapy.

Dr. Kiserud told Reuters Health, "Information on fertility issues is important in clinical oncological practice, and fertility saving tasks should be discussed with patients at risk of post-treatment infertility. Females should be informed that both the treatment and their age at treatment influence their fertility potential."

Wednesday, May 16 is this year's LIVESTRONG Day. Spearheaded by the Lance Armstrong Foundation (LAF), this day is a grassroots initiative intended to unify people affected by cancer and to raise awareness about the disease on a national level and in local communities.

Want to LIVE STRONG on Wednesday?

Think about this:

• Wear yellow. Encourage co-workers, friends, family members, and neighbors to do the same.
• Hold a candlelight vigil in honor of those affected by cancer.
• Say something special at church, a work meeting, a luncheon, a playgroup.
• Volunteer at your local hospital.
• Plant flowers or a garden in honor of cancer survivors.
• Visit this search tool and find official LIVESTRONG Day events in your area. Check here for a listing of all planned events in all cities.
  
• Get to work on next year's LIVESTRONG Day. Stop by the LAF website for more information.