By Deltra James
I remember being a child, lying awake in a dark room, watching moonlight pour in through the window and stretch across the floorboards. It didn’t light the whole room, just a sliver — but it was enough to remind me that there is always light. Years later, I’d wake in that same kind of darkness, not from childhood restlessness but from scanxiety, pain, or grief. Living with metastatic breast cancer feels like that: a room mostly dark, but with glimmers always peeking through. And when they do, you hold them close.
But there’s the grim, too.
The grim is realizing that time is shrinking. It’s watching dreams shift from far-off someday plans to tightly-held, present-tense intentions. It’s losing friends but gaining comrades in the cancer community. It’s falling into the hush of shock again and again — then slowly remembering how to use your voice.
The grim is discovering your treatment isn’t working anymore. And even though your heart sinks, you still ask the next question. Still hope the next line of therapy is your miracle drug.
The grim is being too nauseous to eat, laying curled on the couch while your body aches — and the glimmer is a friend who shows up anyway, quietly dropping off dinner for your family. Because even when you can’t nourish yourself, your people still need to be fed. Expressions of love such as this are glistening moments, wrapping us in light.
The grim is seeing your reflection — scalp exposed, body unfamiliar — and the glimmer is watching your child play in the wigs you collected, trying on each one like a costume of joy. She isn’t afraid of the hair that’s missing. She sees magic in the possibilities. It reminded me to be more childlike. It didn’t fix the grief. It didn’t need to. It was simply a moment of light.
These aren’t silver linings. I’m not here to hand out platitudes. You won’t catch me toting toxic positivity like some pink-clad parade float. No — this isn’t about pretending it’s all okay. This is about noticing the warmth when it shows up, even if it only touches the edge of your day. Because if you don’t make time to feel the glimmers, you risk freezing over.
It’s the little things that keep me here: The way the sun streaks across the kitchen floor as my hands hug a cup of tea. The weight of my cat’s body on my lap.
Touching the grass and thanking it for letting me walk one more day on the green side of the ground.
The glimmer doesn’t erase the grim. It simply holds it with tenderness.
Living in between is an art form — and whether we speak of it or not, we’re all doing it. Those of us with MBC just carry a deeper awareness of how finite our time may be. But the truth is, everyone is holding hands with grief and joy. Everyone is learning how to live inside that tension — where laughter and tears often show up side by side.
I think of glimmers like flashlights. Not because they banish the dark, but because they give us something to focus on. A beam of light we can walk toward, reminding us to keep going even in the darkest parts of this human experience.
Coexisting with the Glimmers and the Grim
Want to learn how to live between them? Here’s what’s helped me:
- Don’t force meaning onto pain. Let it speak for itself. Let it be witnessed, not fixed.
- Say yes to help. Even when you feel guilty. Especially when you feel guilty.
- Honor what’s real. Feel what you feel. The hard stuff doesn’t make the joy any less valid.
- Notice the ordinary glimmers. A warm blanket. A text that says “thinking of you.” An opportunity to share your story. These are sacred.
- Consult a therapist. Especially one trained in oncology. You deserve support from someone who understands the terrain.
- Celebrate the smallest of wins. Got out of bed? Took a shower? Laughed? That counts.
- Live as boldly as you can. This doesn’t mean being loud — it means being you, unmuted and alive.
- Make room for both. You can cry and laugh within the same breath. You can grieve and live at the same time.
- Lean into community. We need others who truly get it — other patients, fellow survivors, people walking the same road.
- Rest when you need to. Rise when you can. That, too, is its own rhythm of survival.
