Every morning ☀ since her Cervical Cancer diagnosis 4 years ago I've told my wife Eve McDavid that I now know what the greatest gift of all is -- another day with her ❤️ ⏳
We are eternally grateful that Eve is now healthy in remission thanks to the best doctors in the world: Onyinye Balogun, MD MS, Eloise Chapman-Davis, Dr. Andrea Dobrenis and everyone at @NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital.
This experience taught me that nothing matters more than health, time and transformation 🦋
I share these lessons as inspiration:
1️⃣ During #cervicalcancerawareness month please make sure you, and your loved ones with a cervix, are up to date with Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommendations for cervical cancer screening. CDC screening link here:
https://lnkd.in/eR9cwPKz
Please also make sure to give the children in your life the gift of health + time by following Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommendations that children receive the cancer preventing HPV vaccine starting at age 9. CDC vaccination link here:
https://lnkd.in/euph7ueN
2️⃣ Unprocessed trauma is a risk factor for cervical cancer. NIH study link here:
https://lnkd.in/eaYjKMcN
It takes courage, but you are strong enough to process what happened to you and mental health professionals are available to help give you the support you need.
3️⃣ Post-Traumatic Growth is always possible:
Although not as well-known as its more popular cousin, PTSD, PTG is a simultaneous truth about trauma.
Eve and I chose to turn this experience into a catalyst for transformative awakening to live a more conscious, integrated, meaningful "second life."
You can too.
4️⃣ Paid medical and family leave matters:
I was able to prioritize health + time by putting my career on pause the day Eve was diagnosed to become her, and our children's, full time caregiver because we were privileged to have access to paid leave.
Everyone deserves the same opportunity.
5️⃣ It's always possible to transform pain into purpose:
We chose to forge purpose out of our pain through advocacy + invention.
Eve left her job at Google to partner with Dr. Balogun to invent a modern cure for cervical cancer. They are now prototyping their new, internationally patented internal radiation device The Blossom with Weill Cornell Medicine.
The Blossom will reduce the trauma of internal radiation for both providers and patients, which will help more providers treat more patients + give more women, and their families, the greatest gift of all: more days healthy together.
We use our privilege to shine 🔦 a spotlight on the unacceptable racial disparities that leave women of color twice as as likely to die from #cervicalcancer as white women.
You, too, have the power to transform your pain into purpose.
#healthcareonlinkedin #cancer #trauma #growth #transformation #healing
https://lnkd.in/e33jWNMs
Eve McDavid was 35 weeks pregnant when her OB/GYN, #NYPWeillCornell’s Dr. Andrea Dobrenis, discovered a mass on her cervix that turned out to be #CervicalCancer. Dr. Dobrenis teamed up with gynecologic oncologist Dr. Eloise Chapman-Davis and Dr. Onyinye Balogun, a radiation oncologist at #NYPBrooklyn, to treat Eve's growing tumor just two weeks after an emergency C-section to deliver her son, Arthur.
Today, Eve is in remission and thanks her care team for being in her corner every step of the way. Learn more about her journey: https://nyphosp.co/3tEHpl7
Columbia University Irving Medical Center, Weill Cornell Medicine
Senior Community Planning and Development Representative at U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development
1moThank you for all you do Dr Witt!