In celebration of National Cancer Survivor’s Day on June 7, The Who’s Roger Daltrey and singer Harry Hudson — who also happens to be a Hodgkin’s lymphoma survivor — shared a clip of a recorded conversation they had where they discuss the disease and the importance of fundraising.
Daltrey, 76, has long been involved with raising money for teens with cancer. He and The Who bandmate Pete Townsend founded Teen Cancer America in 2012 — a foundation that raises money for hospital wings as well as financial and psychological services for families whose teenage children are battling cancer. In the new chat with Hudson, Daltrey stresses the importance of using music as a way to raise money for the cause.
Read More“It’s such an easy way to give back, because you’re doing what you love to do,” Daltrey says in a clip of the chat with Hudson. The full talk between the two will be release later in June. “You’re playing music; you’re raising money for it by playing the music that you love. How hard is that?” Daltrey added.
Hudson — whose debut album Yesterday’s Tomorrow Night was released in 2018 — spoke in the new clip about some of the things he’s doing, as a cancer survivor, to cope during these tumultuous times. He also gave some advice about acceptance to other young people who are going through cancer. Hudson was diagnosed with stage 3 Hodgkin’s lymphoma when he was just 20 years old.
“Don’t push away the dissecting; embrace the pain or the joy or the sorrow you feel, or the hurt, whatever it is” Hudson said. “Embrace it and start slowly letting go.”
The singer added that his own coping mechanisms involve meditation and breathing exercises — something a lot of cancer survivors tell SurvivorNet they came to embrace during the journey.
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“People think meditating is this crazy thing, [but] it’s just breathing,” Hudson said. “Six seconds in, six seconds out, hold it for six seconds. It’s just things that you can do to benefit yourself and put yourself in a calm state, just so you can focus on how to get the negative shit out of your mind.”
In a recent interview with the Associated Press, Daltrey explained that he’s really worried for young people with cancer during the COVID-19 pandemic because they may not be getting the care — both medically and psychologically — they need right now.
"You know, a 15-year old boy could wake up in a bed next to a 2-year-old kid screaming after losing their leg," Daltrey says. "Adolescents and young adults are psychologically and socially completely and utterly different. That affects their spirit."
Mindfulness and the Cancer Journey
As Hudson noted, meditation and mindfulness can be a huge help when someone is struggling with racing thoughts or troubling feelings during the cancer journey.
Shannon Masur, a colon cancer survivor who shared her story with SurvivorNet in a previous conversation, explained that, like many people, she assumed that meditation would be something really difficult — something she couldn’t master. But she actually found it to be really helpful during her health struggles.
Colon cancer survivor Shannon Masur explains how meditation helped during her cancer journey.
“I thought it would be such a challenge,” Masur said. “But it really wasn’t, because [I was taught], when a thought comes in, to feel it and feel the fear but kind of let it go after a few seconds, taking time to sit and just kind of get thoughts out, get all of the negative out of my brain for 10 minutes or an hour — and just having that sense of calmness that comes into me when I’m meditating has been really, really helpful.”
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