Suleika Jaouad

To set a 100-day plan was to will myself into the future, no matter how uncertain it seemed.

— Suleika Jaouad

I joke that I was basically born and raised in airports. I feel most at home at JFK.

— Suleika Jaouad

Writing about cancer is always a challenge for me because it hits so close to home.

— Suleika Jaouad

Where cancer is concerned, it's safe to say there's no such thing as good timing.

— Suleika Jaouad

When you are talking to a dog about cancer, there are no judgments or taboos.

— Suleika Jaouad

Cancer isn't something that makes you want to share, it's something that makes you want to hide.

— Suleika Jaouad

I was born in New York City speaking French at home.

— Suleika Jaouad

Isolated in the oncology ward, I began to think about my dream to become a writer.

— Suleika Jaouad

Cancer makes people think about mortality. It scares your friends and family. And many cancer patients, consciously or otherwise, try to buffer…

— Suleika Jaouad

Before my diagnosis with leukemia, two years ago at the age of 22, I'd always excelled at making resolutions. But I was…

— Suleika Jaouad

Sex can be a squeamish subject even when cancer isn't part of the picture, so the combination of sex and cancer together…

— Suleika Jaouad

Being sick and young is hard in all the ways you might imagine and more, but mostly it can be incredibly boring.

— Suleika Jaouad

My own cancer experience has taught me that the most comforting words from friends have often been both the simplest and the…

— Suleika Jaouad

Often when I wake up in the morning and I'm thinking about my day, I try to imagine if I only had…

— Suleika Jaouad

When I was growing up, traveling was my family's modus operandi. Between the ages of 4 and 18, I attended six different…

— Suleika Jaouad

You know, illness is not something that ever crossed my mind until I got diagnosed with leukemia two years ago at the…

— Suleika Jaouad

Just a few years ago, at the age of 22, I learned I had an aggressive form of leukemia. I needed intensive…

— Suleika Jaouad

Every single one of us will have our life interrupted, whether it's by the ripcord of a diagnosis or some other kind…

— Suleika Jaouad

Even the word 'cancer' is ugly, scary, burdensome - a roadblock for a conversation before it even starts. Who wants to go…

— Suleika Jaouad

Cancer had given me a reverse celebrity status: all the attention for something you didn't want to be known for. I had…

— Suleika Jaouad

Looking back, I call the first month after my diagnosis 'the cancer bubble' because I wasn't showing obvious signs of my disease.…

— Suleika Jaouad

Today, at age 24, when my peers are dating, marrying and having children of their own, my cancer treatments are causing internal…

— Suleika Jaouad

With a Catholic mother and a Muslim father, I've always had a great interest in religion, but I've never practiced one myself.…

— Suleika Jaouad

And I had this sense, even though I couldn't quite wrap my head around what it meant to have a cancer diagnosis…

— Suleika Jaouad

Like a lot of other cancer patients lying in hospital beds or in chemotherapy suites, I have spent a fair amount of…

— Suleika Jaouad

The bone marrow transplant procedure itself can be dangerous, but it is swift, which makes it feel strangely anti-climactic.

— Suleika Jaouad

I think for a lot of women, when we find ourselves in the doctor's office, there's a kind of power dynamic there…

— Suleika Jaouad

Today, my brother and I share almost identical DNA, the result of a successful bone marrow transplant I had last April using…

— Suleika Jaouad

Being in your twenties and trying to figure out who you are and what you want to do in life - with…

— Suleika Jaouad

My mother comes from a small village on the Lac de Neuchatel where there is one bakery, one butcher and one grocery…

— Suleika Jaouad

We have birthdays and bar mitzvahs and funerals and weddings. And these ceremonies and rituals, I believe, really help us transition from…

— Suleika Jaouad

When I was first in the hospital, some of my visitors seemed so intent on not upsetting me that they avoided the…

— Suleika Jaouad

Whether we're too embarrassed or shy - or worried that a discussion about cost might affect the quality of our care -…

— Suleika Jaouad

In my darkest days in the oncology unit, I promised myself that if I ever got into remission one day, I would…

— Suleika Jaouad

My column launched while I was in the bone marrow transplant unit. And I remember waking up the next morning and opening…

— Suleika Jaouad

A growing body of evidence suggests that cancer survivors continue to struggle with medical, financial, professional and psychosocial issues long after the…

— Suleika Jaouad

Like a lot of other young people, I never thought about health insurance until I got sick. I was 22, and my…

— Suleika Jaouad

The steep price tag of cancer treatment needs to continue to be a part of the national conversation, not just the patient-doctor…

— Suleika Jaouad

Well, writing for me had always been my first love and what I leaned on as a way to kind of endure…

— Suleika Jaouad

It took me a long time to be able to say I was a cancer patient. Then, for a long time, I…

— Suleika Jaouad