Dear Lindsay,

I had no idea what awaited me the day I arrived at the Psychology Clinic nearly 18 months ago. Fresh out of the hospital, deeply distressed about my existence, and wanting so badly to stop the tears that poured from my eyes at the slightest mention of cancer, I landed in your care. How lucky for me.

I arrived fragile -- perhaps already broken -- with emotions that were wildly unmanageable. I was anxious, worried, consumed by panic. In search of peace, I told you I wanted more than anything to acquire an easy state of mind, to survive the cancer that faced me, to live without fear that I may once again encounter this disease.

You told me my search could be successful and with a healthy dose of your guided therapy -- and a whole lot more than our intended eight to 10 sessions -- I happened upon the gift of serenity. And my mind is now easy. And I have you to thank.

Thank you, Lindsay, for tending to my wilting spirit, for bracing my fall, for helping me reshape my thoughts and visions, for offering me an abundance of coping tools, for coaching me back into a world where I can bloom.

Your work may be done -- officially. But you will always be at work in my mind. You will always be the one who saved me from a lifetime of darkness. And for that, I am honored to have been your client.

Forever grateful,

Jacki

The CyberKnife -- a powerful new weapon in the war on cancer -- involves no cutting, like the name implies. This robotic system instead uses hundreds of focused radiation beams to destroy a tumor. A robotic arm moves around the patient and an image-guided system tracks the targeted tumor. CyberKnife delivers small blasts of radiation from up to 200 angles and keeps the tumor in its sights at all times. CyberKnife treatments are completed in one to five days which is just one of the benefits of this therapy compared to traditional radiation therapy.

With traditional radiation, patients often endure treatment for five to eight weeks. And healthy tissue can be destroyed every time the patient shifts or breathes. The CyberKnife attacks the cancerous tumor only -- even while the patient breathes. CyberKnife therapy, available in only 50 hospitals in the United States, requires no mold to position patients, can treat anywhere in the body, and can help patients who no longer respond to traditional treatments.

CyberKnife is covered by insurance and approved by Medicare.

I was present for death only one time in my 36 years of life. I consider this both a bad and a good thing. It's bad because I did not want my grandmother to die -- and watching it happen made it so real, so vivid, so painful. I don't think I would have ever chosen to watch my grandma die -- to watch her slip from consciousness to coma, to observe her altered body once death arrived, to witness the movement of her body on a stretcher as it was wheeled out of the house from the bedroom I still see every time I visit my mom's house. But I think I am lucky really -- and this is the good part -- because I got to be with her during her final moments. I got to watch her body as it lay still, peaceful and calm and still breathing. I got to talk to her and although she could not respond, I believe she could hear my words. And it makes me happy to know my grandma may have known I was with just prior to her flight to heaven. And after her flight, I got to touch her cool hands. I got to feel the power of the passing of one life -- a long life -- and I got to feel the comfort of a death that was not ugly or painful or difficult. It was sad -- it's still sad -- that my grandma died three years ago. But what a privilege it was to be part of the day she left this world.

Susan DeWilde left this world in much the same way -- with loved ones by her side. She was a fighter and had conquered several rounds of breast cancer, a tumor in her spinal cord, uterine cancer, lymphatic cancer, and then leukemia, which took her life at the age of 53. I don't know this from Susan herself but from her friend, Christy Mack -- who helped her accept her death and guided her into her own final moments so that she could escape her pain and die peacefully. Christy writes about her beautiful friend and her empowering death in an article that appears in the August 2006 Oprah Magazine. Titled Friends to the End, Christy's story details how she soothed her friend, cradled her hand, and talked her through her last breaths. She helped her on her way during a time her friend feared most. Christy writes, "What she and I shared the night she died was a precious gift of friendship, emotionally profound and sacred in its perfection. It broke my heart. It strengthened my soul."

This I understand.

I have had many moments in my life where anxiety and panic have filled my mind. But this is normal and necessary really as life delivers all kinds of situations that produce all sorts of emotions.

I can recall vividly anxious feelings before a school exam but this is what motivated me to study and prepare and to pass the exam with flying colors. This anxiety gave me a push, a kick in the pants -- in a good, healthy way.

Without a bit of panic, I may not have cared. I may have been aloof to the importance of doing well in school. But while life has presented me with a good amount of this healthy emotion, it has also tossed an abundance of unhealthy anxiety and panic my way -- the kind that has consumed my mind and twisted my insides. The kind that made peaceful living seem impossible.

Many forms of relaxation and meditation go back thousands of years, and modern research has proven that relaxation techniques neutralize stress by producing a calming effect. Stress can exacerbate illness. Relaxation can lessen anxiety, slow your heart rate, and lower blood pressure in the practice of meditation, yoga, progressive muscle relaxation, and biofeedback. Relaxation allows your body to enter into an enhanced healing state.

A Brief Relaxation Exercise with Dr. Lockewood Rush is a 15-minute step by step guided meditation focusing on the breath to stimulate the relaxation response. Provided as a free service, you can listen to the guided relaxation exercise online anytime you wish. Offered by Human Media, as part of Radio Free Humankind, you will be able to experience a soothing of the worries and stress you might be suffering from right now. Dr. Rush speaks in a comforting voice, suggesting that you leave your worries behind as you permit a healing energy to begin to flow through your mind and body in achieving an inner balance of calm. He suggests you can begin to relax and trust that you are a part of the peace and healing you need to be healthy. To listen to the 15-minute guided meditation, follow this link, then click on free: listen online.