'Big dreams despite the diagnosis:' Here's what it's like to fight a brain tumour
CBC
"You don't look like you have a brain tumour."
That's the kind of response Alicia Chenier sometimes gets when she shares her journey with brain cancer with others.
She's never really sure how to respond to that. "I wonder, what is it supposed to look like?"
Chenier says the most important misconception people have regarding brain tumours is that it's an all or nothing situation.
"But it's actually much more nuanced than that," said the 23 year old motivational speaker.
Chenier has had six brain surgeries in her lifetime, with half of those occurring in the past two years as she was trying to obtain her college diploma.
She says living with a brain tumour can feel like "living in the unknown, from scan to scan."
But the uncertainty didn't dissuade her from applying to university, or from making other long-term plans.
"I dream big, because that's what gets me through it," she said.
Dr Iftikharul Haq is a neurosurgeon with the Thunder Bay Health Sciences Center, and has been operating on brain tumours for more than twenty years.
He says he's seen some incredible cases in his career.
"There was one pregnant woman in her 30s who was diagnosed with a malignant tumour," he said.
"I told her that, according to the data, the survival rate for people in her situation was pretty low. But she was very strong, and decided to go ahead with surgery, radiation and chemotherapy."
Haq says the medical team expected it would extend her life by a year or so.