“I have cancer.” Mom said and held me in a tight hug. I could feel her chest shaking as she tried not to cry but failed.

For all of my twenty-four years, my mom had been supportive. Strength and protection had always flowed from her to me. Now I knew it would have to flow the other way.

Mom didn’t stay down for long. After the shock of breast-cancer, she armed herself with a notebook and a pen and a thousand questions for the doctors. She took notes on white blood cell counts and medications with long names as though she were studying for entrance exams into medical school. “The not-knowing is the worst.” she said.

The operation was successful. The chemo (化疗) was the harder part. I went with Mom to every chemo treatment. She rarely complained, though her hair was gone and her toenails and fingernails fell out one by one. She joked that she could save money on nail polish (指甲油) and put it toward the doctor bills, even though she never wore nail polish. “Cancer can take my hair, my nails, my health, my very life. But it can’t take my smile.” Mom said.

Mom learned to share her fears with me, and it formed an even deeper connection between us. Yet I am certain there were fears she didn’t share because she was still protecting me — worries she only shared with Dad. Even in the darkest hours, she would just joke about the cancer. Mom always said, “When you look your greatest fear in the eye and laugh at it, you take away some of its power.”

Mom was one of the lucky ones. She did beat her cancer, though not without scars (伤疤). From her, I’ve learned I may not get to choose what I face, but I do get to choose how I face it.

Oh, how I wish you could see what I see now. I’m older, and life has made me wiser. Nothing is the way I thought it would be, it’s so much better.

When I look back, I see you as one person but I know there were two of you:one that the world saw and the secret one that only you knew. I remember the nights and days filled with worry, sadness, and confusion(困惑). I remember being both of you. I remember the smile I would show to my friends and then I remember the tears no one knew that I cried behind my closed bedroom door.

Oh, how I wish I knew that everything would be okay someday. But I probably wouldn’t have believed it at the time.

Oh, how I remember those teenager years as the most painful years of my life. Living under a microscope（显微镜），everything was enlarged ,you think that whatever happens will stay that way forever. In fact , Nothing is farther from the truth.

Ever heard of Marcel Proust? He had a particularly painful life, but when he came to the end of it, looking back, he felt that the most painful things in his life were the best things in his life, because they made him who he was.

It’s hard to believe, but it’s true. Your teenage years were the best suffering of your life. Those painful breakups, lonely nights, and tears cried are the times that will make you stronger, smarter and shape you become a determined adult in the future.

In the animal kingdom, weakness can bring about aggression in other animals. This sometimes happens with humans also. But I have found that my weakness brings out the kindness in people. I see it every day when people hold doors for me, pour cream into my coffee, or help me to put on my coat. And I have discovered that it makes them happy.

From my wheelchair experience, I see the best in people, but sometimes I feel sad because those who appear independent miss the kindness I see daily. They don’t get to see this soft side of others. Often, we try every way possible to avoid showing our weakness, which includes a lot of pretending. But only when we stop pretending we’re brave or strong do we allow people to show the kindness that’s in them.

Last month, when I was driving home on a busy highway, I began to feel unwell and drove more slowly than usual. People behind me began to get impatient and angry, with some speeding up alongside me, horning (按喇叭) or even shouting at me. At that moment I decided to do something I had never done in twenty-four years of driving. I put on the car flashlights and drove on at a really low speed.

When I put on my flashlights, I was saying to other drivers, “I have a problem here. I am weak and doing the best I can.” And everyone understood. Several times, I saw drivers who wanted to pass. They couldn’t get around me because of the stream of passing traffic. But instead of getting impatient and angry, they waited, knowing the driver in front of them was in some way weak.

Sometimes situations call for us to act strong and brave even when we don’t feel that way. But those are few and far between. More often, it would be better if we don’t pretend we feel strong when we feel weak or pretend that we are brave when we are scared.