“Once I started to visit SolarisCare I could not stop. It is a place I could look forward to going to each week. It was an outing each week that gave me such a positive experience. There was no chance of hearing bad news at SolarisCare it was a really important place for respite from any invasive treatments.” 

Robina Crook was diagnosed with breast cancer at a point in her life when everything seemed to be going well. A successful and talented woman, she faced her diagnosis bravely and appreciated the support offered by SolarisCare. Here’s Robina’s story.

Trying to Keep Things Normal

Life was working out. I was passionate about my job and most importantly, my partner and I had moved in together and were starting to make lots of lovely plans for the future.

I still remember my diagnosis, I was referred to a breast clinic by a doctor but life was hectic and work was busy, a trip to the doctor just seemed more of an inconvenience.  I had these scares before and they had ended up being nothing so all the time remained surprising calm. However this time was different, within days things started to unravel.

I don’t remember telling my partner I was diagnosed with breast cancer, we think we probably nervously laughed about it, and decided just to do all we could to fix it. Telling my family was harder, we had to overcome the vast distance between us and the tough exterior associated with being farmers.

During it all I was still calm. Determined to keep working and have a sense of purpose in my life. As I progressed down this journey, I knew more and became more frightened. Life took on this strange give and take momentum.

Treatment started, it was scary. Surgery followed by the need for chemotherapy, this is when my life really started to change; I was told I could not have children naturally. Tears became the norm.

Surgery, chemotherapy, radiation therapy and a mastectomy were going to give me a chance at life, but it was also taking away our chance of a family and my femininity. Chemotherapy had taken my hair, my chance at continuing my work and it affected my ability to regulate my body temperature.

I fell into a bit of a hole. While I was terrified, I had previously been able to get myself out of bed and go to work but now it seemed like everything was being taken from me.

It is when life seems a bit too hard that magical things can happen. Friends and family helped in any way they could. It was such a comfort to my partner and I to have a constant flow of friends sending us messages, food or sitting with us. To help, I enrolled in a meditation course; I just wanted to find a way to slow down my mind, this was when I was introduced to SolarisCare.

Once I started to visit SolarisCare I could not stop. It is a place I could look forward to going to each week. It was an outing each week that gave me such a positive experience.  There was no chance of hearing bad news at SolarisCare it was a really important place for respite from any invasive treatments.

When diagnosed and going through treatment, it can be difficult to see family, friends and colleagues. Often, unintentionally they would say something to make me cry. Interaction with people became an emotional minefield. At SolarisCare, each appointment is one hour of rest and relaxation with no chance of emotional confusion.

I decided that I needed to give myself a chance to recover in the best possible way. Recovery for me included stilling my mind, massage and reflexology was an important part of that. Each week I managed to get myself off the couch to go see the positive and happy team at SolarisCare. Over the last year, the volunteers at SolarisCare have gotten to know me well and I really look forward to seeing them each week.

The volunteers would tell me how they managed to recover a passion for life after their experience with cancer. One wonderful volunteer at SolarisCare brought in her needle-work she had created during her treatment. It was beautiful and inspired me to be creative. I decided to enter into a costume competition. This was a wonderful way of focusing on something other than me. I named my costume “Alarum (Latin: wings)” it represented a colourful and beautiful metamorphoses rather than the one I felt I was going through.

Now, my partner and I are beginning to explore our options for a family. I never thought I would be in this situation and it seems very surreal. For us family is about a group of people that love and care for each other, it can come in many different forms. We don’t know where this will lead us.

But what we do know, together we will make the most of it, whatever comes our way.

The SolarisCare experience is such that it has motivated me to willingly volunteer to support the Foundation to raise the much needed funds for this incredible free support service to continue. 

I am proud to be a 2015 SolarisCare Dry July ambassador and encourage the community to sign up or donate.