C is for Cupid is a dating service for people whose lives have been affected by cancer. Founded by survivors, their goal is to provide a comfortable and confidential environment for members to connect with compatible singles and friends.

How does it work?

Registered members make a profile that can be viewed by other members and you can browse other member's profiles and chose to communicate through a private mailbox on the website. When you have a message C is for Cupid will send a notice to your registered email that you have mail.

Your email and personal information remains confidential unless you choose to share it. Only those who have registered and have been approved can fully participate in the website.

To learn more about C is for Cupid and read some frequently asked questions go here.

Have you been thinking about lung cancer and longing for the most reliable facts and figures on this number one cancer killer? If so, you're in luck because the National Lung Cancer Partnership has just released a new and free resource called Living With a Diagnosis of Lung Cancer. The booklet features basic questions about what a lung cancer diagnosis means.

"When people hear the words, 'You have lung cancer,' their mind starts racing, and they hear or remember very little of what comes next," said Dr. Joan Schiller, M.D., president of the National Lung Cancer Partnership. "Even in this age of the Internet with information at your fingertips, patients and their families often don't know what to ask or are intimidated about doing so. This booklet was designed to be an easy-to-read resource for many of the initial questions people might have, from what kinds of doctors will be treating you to whether or not a clinical trial is right for you."

Patients can access this resource online, where other links to additional resources are available.

Major League Baseball and the Prostate Cancer Foundation teamed up this year to form the Home Run Challenge in honor of Father's Day. Their gift to father's across the country: for each home run hit in 60 selected games between June 6 and today, June 17, raised money for prostate cancer, the second most common cancer for men in the United States.

Some fans of this cause made pledges; some posted online tributes to their dads at Dockers San Francisco. For every message submitted, the company donated one dollar. Some messages were even shown in Times Square for all to see.

I just checked the status of the Home Run Challenge on this Father's Day morning and found the most updated total of home runs to be 91. Leading the accomplishment are Ken Griffey, Jr., Alex Rodriguez, and Alfonso Soriano. The current Team Home Run leader: the Cincinnati Reds.

Daniel Sieberg, science and technology correspondent for CBS News and blogger for Tech Talk recently went searching for online sites offering help and hope for those seeking insight into the world of cancer.

Sieberg went about his search by typing into Google the word cancer. Thrown back at him were more than 250 million results. Overwhelmed by the sheer volume of information and misinformation, Sieberg sifted and sorted through everything that faced him -- and he narrowed down the results to his favorite five.

Sieberg is right on with his picks, and while I personally would have included The Cancer Blog as a source loaded with accurate, reliable, and inspiring information, I still commend Sieberg for so effectively hunting down some very good cancer resources. For what it's worth, I happen to highly recommend them myself.

American Cancer Society
National Cancer Institute
WebMD
M.D. Anderson Cancer Center
Leroy Sievers Blog

There's this guy. His name is Matthew Zachary. He's a cancer survivor, a motivational speaker, a concert pianist, and the founder of a resource portal for young adults surviving cancer.

Steps for Living, Inc. -- also known as I'm too young for this -- was created by Zachary because he wants us all to know there are awesome cancer support services out there for adolescents and young adults. He means really awesome opportunities -- like spa retreats, online forums and blogs, social networking, camping excursions, fertility education, peer counseling, financial scholarships, and more.

You may be too young for cancer, but you are not alone, says Zachary whose mantra is Get Busy Living. And this is exactly what he is doing, despite challenges and setbacks in his own cancer recovery.

Think about this, an e-mail written by Zachary for those near and dear to his heart:

I am writing to share that I have suddenly gone deaf in my left ear. The condition is called Sudden Sensory Neural Hearing Loss.

After consulting with the country's best hearing experts as well as my oncologist, it has been determined that this is unequivocally a latent, long-term side effect of my post-operative cancer treatments from eleven years ago. Evidently, the excessive radiation dosages to the left hemisphere of my brain have caused irreparable neurological damage to my cochlea, which has ceased functioning.

There may be options (cochlear implants) but I will not know more for several weeks. As you can imagine, this is a devastating blow to my personal life and music career, especially since I remember fighting so hard to regain dexterity and muscle control in my left hand when it ceased functioning prior to my initial diagnosis in 1995.

That said, it has only reinvigorated me to stay the course and continue to advocate on behalf of the more than 500,000 young adults living with, through and beyond cancer each and every year. Now more than ever, I stress the importance of recognizing that remission is not a cure and that public awareness and adequate funding for adolescent and young adult cancer survivorship programming is tantamount to that of cancer research.

This is what it means to be a cancer survivor.

To read more about Zachary's powerful journey, click here for an unbelievably moving essay -- titled The Cost Of Living: No Cure For Cancer -- written by this unbelievably grounded guy.

The best cancer treatment centers are not always right around the corner. Sometimes, it's necessary to travel far and wide to reach facilities offering the latest and greatest in cancer therapy. And when a back-and-forth commute is not possible due to daily or long-term treatment protocols, lodging becomes a necessity. And often, a hassle.

If you find yourself confronted with a stressful travel scenario, key into Joe's House. It's sure to ease your burden.

Think about this:

Joe's House is a non-profit organization that serves hospital staff and cancer patients in search of lodging. Founded in 2003 by Ann Calahan who for six years struggled to find appropriate accommodations during her late husband's cancer battle, Joe's House makes life a little easier for those fighting cancer on the road.

Joe's House features a centralized listing of lodging information for patients to access online or with a simple phone call (877-563-7468). For online searches, a drop-down menu allows patients, loved ones, and caregivers to locate lodging by selecting states, cities, and treatment facilities. Details on each lodging facility are available with information on amenities, rates, and reservation methods, and requirements.

I just gave this system a whirl. I chose Florida as my state, Gainesville as my city, and the hospital where I receive my treatment. Up popped four lodging locations -- two are free for cancer patients, one runs $10 per night, and the other charges $77 per night. Fortunately, I live right around the corner from my treatment center. But for those who don't, this service -- it's free -- is definitely worth trying.

Not everyone buys into the power of pink when it comes to breast cancer.

Pink ribbons, pink teddy bears, pink hats, shirts, scarves, socks, purses, jewelry, magnets, and even cooking appliances have monopolized the breast cancer market. And some people just plain refuse to associate the disease with anything remotely sweet, soft, and soothing.

Think about this:

Annette`s Angels, founded in 2006 by the children of Annette Roberta, love and applaud the effectiveness of the flood of pink used to raise awareness about a disease that took Roberta after a 15-year battle.

But they refuse to embrace any color but black as they proceed to kick breast cancer in the butt. Black reflects their anger at breast cancer. And their power to fight it.

Annette's Angels are committed to fighting this terrible disease, and they invite us all to shop at their online store, where some items -- there's just no way around it really -- are pink. The angels will donate 50 percent of all profits to FORCE: Facing Our Risk of Cancer Empowered, the only resource of its kind for those facing genetic breast and ovarian cancers.

There are four pages in the March 2007 Reader's Digest featuring amazing discoveries, devices, tests, and cures. And many of the snippets of information are -- yes -- somehow linked to cancer.

Think about this:

• A new ultrasound technique lets radiologists distinguish between malignant and benign breast lesions. Using elasticity imaging, researchers accurately identified harmless and cancerous lesions in almost all of the 80 cases studied. If results can be reproduced in a large trial, this technique could significantly reduce the number of breast biopsies required.

• Scientists seeking new treatment for diseases can use an online tool developed by researchers at MIT and Harvard. The Connectivity Map matches diseases with compatible drugs, based on the genetic profiles of both. So far, about 160 drugs and compounds are cataloged, and a few new uses for existing drugs have already been suggested. Eventually, all FDA-approved drugs will be included.

• For those who sometimes forget to take their pills, a new device -- that can be preloaded with up to 100 doses of medication -- could one day be implanted in the body and programmed to administer drugs via wireless signals. This device, successful in tests using dogs, was designed to deliver medicines that are less effective when taken orally.

Sometimes it seems cancer's grip is tightening. Other times, in the war against this pesky disease, it seems we are on the verge of something really great.

What can I do at Careplace?

At Careplace you can connect with others who's lives are like yours. Discuss treatments in online forums, create personal webpages, show support with virtual hugs, send private messages, create your own photo albums, groups and online journals.

• Join or start a group - Groups are places that people can organize to discuss common interests. If you take a certain medication and want to discuss your progress or side effects, you can share with other group members who take this medication. You can also create groups about fishing or baseball, anything goes!
• Join a discussion - Forums are where people come together to support one another, ask questions and share news or experiences.
• Send a private message - Sending private messages is a great way to get to know others better, share a friendly greeting or ask them for more information about something with which they have some experience.
• Send someone a hug - Sending hugs are an easy way to show someone you care and remind them they are not alone.

Careplace is a knowledge portal that isn't bogged down with medical jargon and words you don't understand. The pages have lists of personal experiences people have had with medications,treatments, doctors and hospitals.

Early trials show a breath test for lung cancer detection may surface in the not-too-distant future. And it could be simple, inexpensive, non-invasive, and effective too.

The tests needs a good amount of work still, but if we keep our fingers crossed and medical researchers stay hot on the trail of this test, it just might be possible to one day spot lung cancer by simply breathing into a device for a few minutes.

The lung cancer breath test measures chemicals called volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in the breath. There's a certain pattern of VOCs associated with lung cancer, and they show up as colored dots across a quarter-sized panel.

The theory behind this test is great. The test itself is not perfect yet, however.

It's promising, though, says The Cleveland Clinic's Peter Mazzone, MD, MPH and colleagues who describe the test in the Online First edition of the journal Thorax and reveal the test correctly identified in studies three out of four people with lung cancer and detected lung cancer almost as frequently.

I want to share some of the many new and exciting things I came across and learned about at the Young Survival Breast Cancer Conference. One online support group I found to be very helpful and innovative is called Pink-Link. It was started only a year ago and I think this is something that is needed in the breast cancer community.

The Pink-Link Breast Cancer Support Network provides valuable community and support resources for women affected by breast cancer.

Pink-Link is a nonprofit organization and all breast cancer support services are free. Pink-Link's key service, the online database of breast cancer patients and survivors, creates an intimate and personal link between breast cancer patients and survivors. The organization was founded by Victoria Tashman in 2005.

After completing a year of breast cancer treatment, Victoria wanted to give back to the community who supported her. Victoria had a wide support group of friends and family and met many women who were battling breast cancer on their own. Some of these women were afraid of talking to their doctors, asking them questions, and finding out more about their diagnosis and treatment.

Victoria realized that not all women take advantage of their local support groups, either because they didn't know about them, didn't feel comfortable in a group, or weren't able to go to group meetings.

She also realized that in most group meetings, the chances of meeting another breast cancer patient or survivor with the same diagnosis, recommended treatment, family situation, and other such details was very slim.

Victoria created Pink-Link to fill this void. By creating an on-line database of patients and survivors, Victoria envisions women diagnosed with breast cancer getting the particular, targeted support they need from the comfort of their own home. Victoria believes in the power of women helping other women and is positive that through Pink-Link, women with breast cancer can face their illness with increased knowledge and confidence.

Not too many days left until Christmas, but for those of us who still have some shopping left to do, Shopexa is an opportunity to benefit charity while we finish finding perfect presents for family and friends.

It won't cost you anything extra to shop and buy this way, and Shopexa will donate 50 percent of its profits from the purchases you make to the charity of you choice. Some of the charities included will benefit cancer, end hunger, save the environment, children, women and the homeless.

Shopexa was launched on December 15th, with Jay Siva as the founder. According the background information provided on the Shopexa website, Siva is a self-published author and webmaster who seeks to create and develop new innovative projects that will fill real needs. Shopexa is affiliated through Amazon, and Amazon handles all transactions and purchases.

You can make Shopexa your home page, choose your charities and invite friends to join you. From what I can tell, Shopexa will be a year-round service. As for Christmas shopping, unless you are one of those extremely efficient shoppers who completed their holiday shopping weeks ago, this is a chance to make a difference in the life of someone we may never meet, while spending money we would be spending anyway. It is the essence of the Christmas spirit.

Thanks Mike Marshall for this tip!

And too, our very own Allie Beatty has created an advertising portal for the largest shopping sites to benefit research in finding a cure for cancer, diabetes, lung and heart diseases. Shop4Cures earns advertising commissions when visitors click through and shop her affiliates, and her profits are donated to cure research. By offering coupons, free shipping, and other incentives she hopes to encourage people to use Shop4Cures for their online shopping.

My father taught me that when you have a problem, find someone else who has the same problem and talk to them about it. Real life experiences trump almost every other kind of information. Although women are 100 times more likely than men to be diagnosed with breast cancer, and less than one percent of breast cancer patients are men, men do get breast cancer.

Some of the signs of breast cancer include:

• Lump or thickening in the breast.
• Skin dimpling or puckering.
• Development of a new retraction or indentation of the nipple.
• Redness of scaling of the nipple or breast skin.
• A spontaneous clear or bloody discharge from the nipple.
  

Some of the known risk factors include: age, family history, genetic predisposition, radiation exposure, Klinefelter syndrome (a congenital abnormality of the sex chromosomes X and Y), exposure to estrogen, liver disease, excess weight and excess alcohol consumption.

Breast cancer resources for men are few and far between, but to follow my father's advice about finding someone to talk to and learn from that has faced the same real life experience, I tracked down several resources men diagnosed with breast cancer might find of interest.

Newsday is featuring the personal story of breast cancer survivor Cameron Alden. Alden tells his breast cancer story as part of a personal cause to raise awareness that men can be diagnosed with breast cancer.

USA Today's Richard Roundtree 'Knows the Score' on cancer features breast cancer survivor Roundtree's personal story and his work with the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation to raise men's awareness about the disease.

The John W. Nick Foundation was created in memory of John W. Nick, who died from breast cancer at the age of 58. Male breast cancer survivors John W. Nick, Captain Edward J. Wilson, Bob Stafford, Walter Creekmore, David Eisenberg, Mark Eldridge, Dave Lyons, and Ken Graham by Sue Graham share their personal stories of breast cancer on the foundation website.

MALEBC is a discussion mailing list for men with breast cancer. Currently it has 27 members.

Because men often face shock, embarrassment and isolation when diagnosed with breast cancer, the National Breast Cancer Centre has launched Breast Cancer in Men, Australia's first website launched for men with breast cancer offering information and resources from diagnosis to living beyond breast cancer written specifically for men.

The American Cancer Society estimates that 1,720 men will receive a breast cancer diagnosis this year, and 460 men will die from the disease. For men, breast cancer is most frequently diagnosed between the ages of 60 and 70. If any of our readers are aware of other internet resources specifically written for men facing breast cancer, please leave the resource and a link in the comments area following this post.

The Men Against Breast Cancer organization wants to help men get involved in helping the women they love battle breast cancer. Their symbol, a pink and blue ribbon signifies the war against breast cancer is one that men and women must face together.

Marc Heyison and Steve Peck are the founders of Men Against Breast Cancer (MABC). Marc's mother was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1992. He understands how a breast cancer diagnoses impacts not only the patient but the entire family.

The website states that this is the first non-profit organization to provide targeted support services to educate and empower men to be effective caregivers when breast cancer strikes a female loved one; as well as, target and mobilize men to be active participants in the fight against breast cancer.

You can find many resources on the website such as the Partners in Survival workshop that brings practical advice and tips to help the whole family. Special emphasis is placed on men understanding the physical and emotional needs of their female partners.

The website will also have available in January of 2007 a book called For the Women We Love: A Breast Cancer Battle Plan and Caregivers Action Guide for Men.

Check out Self magazine's 2006 breast cancer handbook that is available online. Some of the features and articles include How to help your friend diagnosed with breast cancer, which gives tips to support your friend every step along the way of her cancer journey. You can also learn how to be more informed about breast cancer yourself by taking the breast cancer IQ test or reading the article The Stages of Breast Cancer to better understand the disease.

In another article, Legacy's of Strength, actresses Christina Applegate and Brittany Murphy along with singer Mya talk about something they all have in common. All three of their mothers have been diagnosed with breast cancer. The three women share their experiences and the knowledge that they too might be at risk and how they handle it in their own lives.