At a recent chapel service, Tricia Bell, Chief Legal Counsel for Medi-Share, shared about her experience with breast cancer over the past year. And while she never glosses over the hardship, Tricia’s honest testimony centers around one major theme: Gratitude.
Opening with a relatable note of humor, Tricia tells of an ongoing “ailment” of control. She doesn’t like surprises. Even the sweet kind of surprises that come with holidays or momentous occasions tend to cause her anxiety.
Naturally, being diagnosed with breast cancer is the worst kind of surprise – but that’s exactly the news she received in October of 2023 – Breast Cancer Awareness Month, of all times. The next months were filled with multiple treatments, as more tests revealed that the carcinoma had spread to her lymph nodes. Anxious thoughts threatened to overtake her. “I knew God could do anything,” Tricia says, “but I didn’t understand why he wasn’t intervening in my situation.”
She doesn’t sugar-coat the reality one bit. Treatment made her feel physically worse than she did pre-diagnosis. “Chemotherapy brings you to your knees,” she says, recounting the toll it took on her body. And yet, it turns out there is no better place to fight cancer. Because it was there, on her knees, that God did a mighty work, helping her replace control and anxiety with thankfulness and peace.
As a result, Tricia formulated what she called her “anti-bucket list”, a compilation of all the wonderful reasons to be living. Her list included everything from relationships to laughter to sunsets; it spanned everyday kindnesses as well as the very procedures that caused her pain. It also included the care and support she received from her co-workers and the larger Medi-Share community.
A year later, Tricia acknowledges that there really is no “after” to cancer – it changes you physically, emotionally, and mentally forever. But now, three little words penned in her daughter’s journal mean more than ever: “God’s got her.”
When she vacillates between grief and gratefulness, as we all do, this is the reality that grounds her. God’s in control. “Suffering can be the breaking of you or the making of you,” she says. “What I’m making of it is gratitude.”
Watch Tricia’s raw, heartfelt chapel testimony in the link below – especially if you find yourself in a current season of breaking. In addition, remember that Breast Cancer Awareness Month is the perfect time to schedule a mammogram and utilize self-exam best practices. We are so grateful for you and your vital part in this community.
