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Dublin: 9 °C Wednesday 22 May, 2013

‘Cancer leaves you feeling harder on the outside and softer on the inside’ – Áine Lawlor

Journalist and cancer survivor Áine Lawlor said that the experience had brought her ‘into a community’.

Áine Lawlor (file photo)
Áine Lawlor (file photo)
Image: Sasko Lazarov/Photocall Ireland

THE WELL KNOWN Irish radio and television broadcaster Áine Lawlor was given an additional title yesterday – that of cancer survivor.

Speaking of her own personal experience with the disease at the launch of Daffodil Day 2013, Lawlor spoke of being left “harder on the outside and softer on the inside” as a result.

While cancer introduced both sufferers and their families to some very harsh realities, she said it was the softness that had stayed with her.

Remembering the “great kindness and support” that followed her cancer diagnosis, it helped bring her “into a community” that she hadn’t known before

You don’t know the way that people leave vegetables and dinners at your front door. You don’t know about the way that neightbours just take your children and look after them for you.

“People do all those kind things for you because they know you have cancer,” she said.

Speaking of “the privilege” of sitting in a cancer ward, the realisation soon hit that there was nothing unique about her situation and that “there’s hundreds and thousands of people in this country going through these treatments.”

We can’t cure cancer. We can’t make these horrible realities go away and too often we can’t take the pain away from the lives of our loved ones.
But what we can do, and what we do on Daffodil Day, is to support the work of the Irish Cancer Society.

Read: Daffodil Day campaign aims to raise €3.4m >

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Comments (7 Comments)

  • I’m so happy that this brave lady has survived her illness. Aine Lawlor has the most beautiful, natural, Irish accent and speaking voice on RTE and intelligence to match!

    Reply
  • What a warrior! She is much more than a survivor. Help is coming everyone…tumor targeting…smart bombs for cancer are coming….chemo is on the way out….have hope. Here is a video telling the future of cancer.. Go to http://www.sto-online.org and once there go to “patient perspectives” banner, to see a short interview with me, the stage four patient. The video is over a year old and I am doing fine. We are going from precision medicine, which is what we have now, to personalized medicine, where they check your genome and tailor the drugs to you, Keep hope, and you will keep strength.

    Reply
    • John, just watched it all, amazing stuff, i am a firm believer for a few years now that chemotherapy is doing more harm in some cases and i believe the head of the John Hopkins has come out recently and confirmed it! So glad this treatment is working and has worked for you! May you and your wife Mary enjoy many more years together:)
      Also delighted to see a great Irish talent has pulled through and come out the other side, it’s only when we are faced with such troubles we get to see the best side of neighbours and friends :)
      Wishing Gods richest blessings on both of you and so many others faced with their own mortality x

      Reply
    • What a thoughtful person you are. How we got 8 thumbs down, between us, is beyond me. It is true that our disease brings out the very best in our friends and family and kindness is magnified when we need it so much. Unfortunately, the affects of someone being cruel and unkind are also magnified as we are so weak and vulnerable it is seared into you. It would be a hard road to follow if you we’re not in love.

      Reply
  • What she is saying is apt, I was diagnosed with oesophageal cancer in 2006 when I was 32 and saw things that people should never see – it has changed my attitude to life for good, what else could it do.

    Reply
  • Unfortunately tomorrow we bury my uncle who lost his battle with cancer, really wish there was a cure.

    Reply

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