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"There was an article in Tuesday&amp;amp;#8217;s New York Times focusing on young adults and cancer&amp;amp;#8212;a topic we&amp;amp;#8217;re all very familiar with. There was no mention of leukemia or lymphoma (a major oversight, in my opinion) but there were some interesting patient profiles, like a 29-year-old doctor who was diagnosed with colon cancer, and a nice shout out for my friend Matthew Zachary, a brain cancer survivor who has a great new website imtooyoungforthis.org. In terms of the psychological issues we young people with cancer face, there wasn&amp;amp;#8217;t anything in there that we don&amp;amp;#8217;t discuss right here every day&amp;amp;#8212;how it impacts your love life and your career and your fertility, etc., etc. But there were some eye-opening (and quite frankly depressing) statistics in there, like the following: &amp;amp;#8220;The rates of some cancers, including colorectal, thyroid and testicular, are rising in people ages 20 to 39, according to the American Cancer Society. And a report released in August by the National Cancer Institute and Lance Armstrong Foundation found that even as cancer survival rates continued to improve in adults of middle age and older, the survival rates for people ages 15 to 39 had not risen substantially in more than two decades.&amp;amp;#8221; Yikes. But the piece did enforce some things that can help: We need more clinical trials and more doctors trained specifically for young adults, and research to understand why the rates of certain cancers are rising. There is also a need to explore how young people may respond differently to treatment regimens&amp;amp;#8212;many of which are tested mostly in older adults or in children. Hopefully people are listening. As for the &amp;amp;#8220;too young for this&amp;amp;#8221; question, which was raised by the title of the piece (Too Young for This: Facing Cancer Under 40), of course I agree. Yes, we are too young for this. Even though I&amp;amp;#8217;m now the big 2-9 (thanks for all the bday wishes yesterday), I&amp;amp;#8217;m still too young for this. But I also think my mom would be too young for cancer and so would my grandma, for that matter. Bottom line: There is never a good time to get cancer, no matter how old you are. Sure, I sometimes wonder if I&amp;amp;#8217;d be better off if I were diagnosed later in life. It certainly would make things easier if I&amp;amp;#8217;d already had three children. But then again, I&amp;amp;#8217;d have three children who&amp;amp;#8217;d have to go through my cancer with me and that&amp;amp;#8217;s not something I&amp;amp;#8217;d wish on anyone. And if I weren&amp;amp;#8217;t diagnosed at 23 I wouldn&amp;amp;#8217;t have had the past five years of my crazy cancer rollercoaster with all the writing and speaking and fundraising and actually making a difference in people&amp;amp;#8217;s lives and learning what I&amp;amp;#8217;m really made of. I feel lucky to have had such a life-shaping experience at such a young age. Some people wait their whole lives for that. I don&amp;amp;#8217;t know what the answer is. What do you guys think? &amp;amp;#8212;Erin"^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.glamour.com/health-fitness/blogs/life-with-cancer/2007/01/are-we-too-young-for-cancer>