‘The darkness lifted – and life became indescribably beautiful’: In a deeply moving message to Kate, cancer-survivor JANE GREEN reveals the one daily habit she’s convinced helped save her

The Princess of Wales, poised and stoic in her Friday video revealing her cancer diagnosis, gave no indication of the many things she is likely to feel, the fears she faces, the thoughts that cross her mind in the middle of the night keep awake. .

Her priority will be not only her health, but also the emotional well-being of her three young children, so that they know only what they absolutely need, with all the positive spin she can muster: Mom shall be okay.

When I was diagnosed in 2014 at the age of 46 with malignant melanoma – a particularly aggressive form of skin cancer that could not simply be scraped away and forgotten, but required surgery and biopsies of nearby lymph nodes, six-monthly check-ups. ups and recurring worries about my surgeon’s warning that ‘melanomas have a habit of returning’ – my children seemed surprisingly untroubled.

At 10, 11 and 14, they weren’t too young to understand, but we also just told them what to do. The necessities – told with a smile.

My husband and I explained why I would be having surgeries and spending time in bed, why I wouldn’t necessarily be available to them as I had been before, while also making sure they knew I would be okay.

Of course, I didn’t know I would be okay. But I needed the kids to believe that I would be too, just as Kate needs hers to believe that too – both for her and for them.

I am indeed convinced that life is where you look; that if you seek the good, you will undoubtedly find it. In this sense, Kate’s message of hope—assuring us that she is “doing well” and “getting stronger”—takes on a more poignant and powerful resonance.

At a time when I could have fallen into despair—and I certainly had my moments—my diagnosis taught me that we are largely powerless against what life throws at us. Where our power comes in is in how we choose to deal with those curveballs.

Shortly before my cancer was discovered, an acquaintance of mine, a recovering alcoholic, had asked if he could add me to his “morning text list.” I had no idea what this meant, but I agreed. He was going through an incredibly difficult time and it was clear he needed support.

He had just been left by his wife, his children refused to talk to him, he had lost his job and was living in a dingy apartment above a friend’s garage.

In short, everything that could go wrong, had gone wrong.

The next morning, his text arrived: a “gratitude list” of three things he was grateful for.

Every morning this man woke up and instead of focusing on the many things that were going wrong in his life, he chose to look for the few things that were going right.

They were often small or seemingly insignificant – that he had remembered to buy his favorite coffee, or that a neighbor had been kind – but it was a huge learning experience for me.

When I was diagnosed with cancer, the scariest moments were in the middle of the night, when the house was quiet and everyone was asleep, when there was no one to distract or reassure me.

I lay in bed, my thoughts inevitably going to dark places, terrified for my children, terrified that the cancer might have spread, terrified of impending chemotherapy, of being terribly ill, of wasting away.

A few years earlier I had lost one of my best friends to this terrible disease.

I had seen her begin with strength and determination, know she would beat it, but her cancer would metastasize and turn into a demon she couldn’t fight.

That gratitude list I received every morning showed me what I needed to do to keep anxiety from consuming me.

Every time I noticed my mind wandering into a dark place, I forced myself to think of three things I was grateful for.

Even though it all felt a bit strange, it stopped me spiraling – and it quickly became a habit, one that I have continued to this day.

Since then, I’ve read a lot about gratitude, and specifically how practicing gratitude has the ability to rewire the neural pathways in our brains.

Scientists have discovered that happiness is indeed a choice – and if you don’t know how to choose it, practicing consciously focusing on the positive aspects of life is a good place to start.

As I struggled with my diagnosis, I discovered that once I started focusing on the things I was grateful for, everything changed.

The sky became bluer, the trees greener, everything sharp and unbearably beautiful.

I saw the world through completely different eyes and was amazed at how lucky I was to live in it, however long that might be.

Robert Emmons, professor of psychology at the University of California, said this: “Gratitude is an enduring approach to life that can be freely chosen for yourself. It is the choice to focus on blessings rather than burdens, on gifts rather than curses, and people report that it changes their lives.”

In an article published by the National Library of Medicine in 2022, researchers found that “gratitude was specifically associated with successful coping with physical symptoms, emotional support, improved attitudes toward death…humanity and the familiar environment .’

I don’t follow an organized religion, but I believe in a God – a Higher Power – and when I was sick I prayed daily.

I didn’t pray for a good outcome because I understood that I had no control over what might happen to my health. Instead, I prayed for the strength and grace to deal with whatever came my way.

Ten years later my cancer has still not returned. Life hasn’t always been easy during these ten years, but the most important lessons I learned during my short dance against cancer have stayed with me.

When hard times come, when life feels scary or overwhelming, I still turn to gratitude.