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Continue reading →: Twelve weeks laterI made it through the first twelve weeks of chemotherapy one day at a time, though even that feels like too generous a phrasing now. There were no heroic dawns or moments of gritty resilience. There was only the slow, methodical disintegration of my body, the chemicals burning their way…
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Continue reading →: The only way out is through
April 2024 – Cycle two By April 2024, I was on my second cycle of chemotherapy, and already the world had shrunk down to two places: my living room, and the hospital. Everything else – the shops, the parks, the simple pleasure of walking around my neighbourhood – seemed like…
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Continue reading →: The birthday feeling
Every year, as my birthday approaches, a familiar restlessness begins to hum inside me. It starts quietly, an unease that sits somewhere behind my ribs, and then gathers strength, rising like a tide I cannot hold back. It is not really about getting older. It is about feeling like I…
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Continue reading →: One infusion at a time
The second chemo was supposed to be easier. At least that’s what they’d said – the second time, you know what to expect, you’ve got the routine down. You pack your bag, bring your water bottle, a blanket, your snacks. You sit in the chair; you let the drugs drip…
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Continue reading →: The first week after chemo
The first week after chemo felt like crossing into a new country where nothing made sense and the rules changed without warning. I came home from the hospital late that afternoon, after five hours in the chemo chair, exhausted and trembling from the inside out. I was clutching a handful…
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Continue reading →: The quiet harm
When I was first diagnosed with cancer, I thought the real enemy was inside my body – a rogue cluster of cells that had turned against me. But as the months passed, and I faced the long silence that comes after chemo, I began to realise the more difficult enemy…
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Continue reading →: A variant of uncertain significance
Monday 25 March 2024. The genetic test results. When the call came that my genetic testing results were ready, I felt a knot form in my stomach that would not unravel, no matter how many deep breaths I took. I had been waiting for this day with equal parts dread…
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Continue reading →: The first chemo
13 March 2024 I didn’t sleep the night before. The portacath insertion had left me dazed, the double dose of fentanyl still swirling in my veins, my body heavy but my mind jittery and restless. My head spun in uneven circles, as though I were still lying on the operating…
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Continue reading →: The port
Just another body waiting for another procedure. It was only a week since the surgeon had inserted the tiny metal clip into my breast -my first real marker that this was happening, that cancer had taken up residence in my body and was now being mapped like hostile territory. And…
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Continue reading →: The shaved head was a hinge
I had swung through, but the room on the other side was unfinished. The nurses told me first. Before the diagrams about drug cycles, before the list of possible side effects with their careful, professional voices – they told me my hair would fall out. It arrived in the same…
Hello,
I’m Michelle
Hi, I’m Michelle Aziz; writer, cancer survivor, and advocate for women navigating life after diagnosis.
I’m currently writing my debut memoir, The Year My Boobs Tried to Kill Me, an honest, sometimes darkly funny, and deeply human account of my experience with breast cancer and the messy, beautiful process of rebuilding life afterwards.
Writing became my way to heal, a way to make sense of everything cancer took, and everything it gave back. Through words, I found strength, clarity, and connection; and now I help other women do the same.
Through my volunteer peer support work with Cancer Council Queensland and my growing advocacy for women with cancer, I’ve discovered a new purpose: to use my story and lived experience to help others feel seen, supported, and hopeful about their future.
Healing Through Words is where I share stories, reflections, and conversations that remind us we are more than our diagnosis, and that healing, like writing, begins one word at a time.
Let’s connect
New book coming soon!
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