Tag Archives: surgery

Abigail Wald: Spinning Straw Into Gold



Abigail Wald is founder of YES Bar and Real Time Parenting. Abigail talks about the serious health challenges faced by her two young sons, and how these experiences of adversity spurred her entrepreneurial spirit and led her to start two new businesses. Abigail also talks about how the parenting tools she learned helped her to achieve her lifelong goal of teaching people to communicate effectively and leave the world a little better off than how she found it.


Steven Weiss-Smith: Strength is in Being Vulnerable



Steven Weiss-Smith was 13 years old when his father died of metastatic melanoma. Now 44 years old, the age at which his father passed away, Steve talks about the ways in which his father’s death—and especially his lack of understanding about his father’s illness at the time—has affected him throughout his life. He reflects on the ways in which his professional choices have incorporated ways of trying to get to know the man who he knew only as his father, though the eyes of a child.


Charlie Tercek: Seeking Normalcy During and After Cancer



How does one maintain routine and regularity when a cancer diagnosis and its treatment threatens to upend life as one knows it?

Today I’m speaking with Charlie Tercek, who in 2010 was diagnosed with and treated for bladder cancer. Charlie talks about the critically important role his family played in taking the lead to find the right care when the route he initially chose did not go as planned. He also reflects on the way that cancer has made him more willing to move on quickly from experiences that don’t work out as expected, how going through the experience together strengthened the bond between him and his wife, and his feelings of gratitude for what he has.


Father’s Day Special Episode



Father’s Day is a celebration honoring fathers and celebrating fatherhood, paternal bonds, and the influence of fathers in society. To mark the day we’re doing a special extra episode of the Real Cancer podcast.

Unlike other episodes, this one doesn’t focus specifically on cancer and it doesn’t feature a conversation with a single individual. Rather, this crowdsourced episode includes the voices of nine sons, daughters, mothers, and fathers reflecting on what they are thinking about on this Father’s Day.