How Cancer Made Me Unapologetically Myself - Mina Yun

On a scale of 1-10, how well do you handle change?

My interview today with 2x cancer survivor Mina Yun covers how to create changes in your life by building the right support systems. We talk about our resistance to change and detaching from our suffering.

Make sure to tune in every other Tuesday for a new episode on Heart of Humans!

1:32 Why health is Mina's passion
4:42 Discovering breast cancer
8:58 Creating the opportunity for growth
12:25 Resistance as signs of denying oneself of expression or pleasure
17:03 Building your own support system
22:53 Relationship to suffering
24:35 How cancer shaped my intention

Mina Yun: 
https://www.fitgirlacademy.com/
https://www.instagram.com/fitgirlrichgirl/

Transcript

Jen Li: 0:01

The heart of humans podcast explores the secrets to building flourishing relationships. We demystify the elements of desire, trust and love by interviewing conscious lovers and providing reflections to help you create the relationships of your dreams. When I think about how much we struggle to understand our bodies and the length of time it takes to accept small changes, such as a receding hairline or new weight gain. It's like we must get to know ourselves again. Some of us during the pandemic saw people close to us, if not ourselves to deal with the health crisis, forcing us to completely reinvent our relationship with ourselves. When I invited Mina Yuan onto the show, I couldn't help but think how a personal trainer and health coach dealt with her experience with breast cancer twice. with cancer survivors, they say you never really know of cancer, we'll come back. But this mother shares how she made cancer an opportunity for her to create powerful changes. In this episode, we talk about detaching from suffering, and how we can create our own support systems mean his journey left me feeling super pumped. And I hope it gives you a new perspective on dealing with a health crisis. Thank you for joining us today, Mina. As a personal trainer, and a wellness coach, you must have been committed to your health before cancer came into your life. I want you to tell me why health became your passion. Hi, Jen.

Mina: 1:32

So this is so exciting. And thank you for asking me this question. And you know, how I really got into this whole industry was really by accident at first, you know, when I when I was a kid, I was a musical genius, I don't think I was proficient in anything less than seven instruments. So it's just kind of like when I go to school, I'm going to be a musician, and I got my bachelor's degree degree in music education. And then I graduated, and then it took a few years for me to realize, wait, I don't want a career in music. So this is one of those things where I said, Well, what the heck am I gonna do with my life. And I gave it a lot of thought. And I thought, you know, I, I've always loved the human body. I've always loved health. And it wasn't, you know, maybe in another lifetime, I would have ended up becoming a doctor or or, or a naturopath or something along those lines. But it is just not something I wanted to invest in at that stage in my life. So I got into personal training. And I became a, you know, I really intended to be a different kind of personal trainer, you know, a lot of people come to me and say, mean, I want to lose weight, or I want to be this dress size, or I want to look better, and we do that. But how I do that is really look at how you feel like I start, I start off by asking you questions, like, how do you sleep? How many hours do you sleep? Do you wake up in the middle of the night to go pee? Oh, what do you mean, that's not normal? like no, that's not normal? You know? How often do you have menstrual cycles? Do you have PMS? Do you have hot flashes? If you're in menopause? I talked about your pool, I talked about what your stools look like, you know, what do they look like? How often do you have bowel movements? I asked like these questions, because I'm not just interested in having you look good. I'm interested in having you feel good and be healthy from the inside out. So when I have clients that come to me and said, Oh my god, you know, I'm actually having bowel movements every day, instead of like, twice a week, like that just turns me on. The conversation around stools is so sexy, or people suddenly saying, I'm not having mood swings anymore, where I'm having more energy, or I'm sleeping through the night, these things just just absolutely make me so happy. So I'm not just a person that makes you look good on the outside, I really work from the inside out. And so that's a huge passion of mine is to really work holistically with my clients.

Jen Li: 4:11

It's really unexpected to know someone who is so passionate about health and that they have to face a health crisis. And since I'd imagine that you'd spend so much time training your body and managing your diet to be in its top performance. And the global health crisis we're facing today has put a lot of uncertainty into our future and it seems like even Healthy People are not immune to complex biological stressors. I want to know what was your first thought when you discovered you had cancer?

Mina: 4:50

Or the very first thought well, actually when I went to go see the doctor for the lump and he He did a manual breast exam and he asked me some questions. Do you have a family history? I said, No. He said, How old are you? And at the time, I was 44, and which is very young for breast cancer. And, and he asked me a couple of other questions and he did a breast exam. The lump was there, he could feel a lump. And he said, Well, I don't think it's anything but I'll order you a mammogram and ultrasound. Anyways, I'm like, Okay, and so at my thought, I'm like, I'm fine. And I, of course, I google everything, right? So I was like, I research everything. And I think about 80% of lumps are benign. So I'm like, Oh, yeah, so the odds are in my favor, it's fine. And then I think I got a phone call. And it was a message saying, Oh, yes, the doctor would like to see you as soon as possible, we got your results in and that's never a good sign if they want to see you as soon as possible. And of course, it's Friday. So now I have to wait till Monday to call them and, and book an appointment. So I got the results of the report. And I was a little bit stunned. I'm like, Okay, um, well, what did you see? And they said, well, there's some vascularity, which means the tumors growing veins. And so when you're growing up blood supply, that's never a good sign. And, and so then I got, I got the report. And I read all of it. And they had a whole bunch of medical gobbledygook and then I had a rating. It's a bi rads five, like, what is that? And so there's a bi reds rating score from zero to five or one to five. And I was a five. So I googled What does bi rads five mean? And generally, the rating, it's a radiologist rating. But generally, if you're a bi reds, five, it's their 95% positive, it's breast cancer. And that's when it hit me. So I was like, calling I called my spouse. And I was like, Oh, my God, this is not good. This is not good. And so once I understood that Now, the thing, you never really know for sure until you actually get the biopsy. But that was the moment that I was 95% sure, I had breast cancer. And I'm like, Well, what, what would be the other 5%. And I realized the other 5% was, I don't know, maybe if you had like a physical injury to the breast like someone hit, you got hit in the breast really hard that it could produce like a blood, like a blood clot, which didn't happen. So I was like, This is breast cancer. So I knew at that moment, even though it took like a couple weeks for them to confirm it with the biopsy. But from that moment, that's what I knew.

Jen Li: 7:46

So coming from your experience, why do you think a health crisis can pose a challenge, not just to ourselves, but to our relationships as well.

Mina: 7:58

There's so many different ways that, you know, so many emotions that I had when I was diagnosed with breast cancer. Okay, that one was, like, you've got to be kidding me. You've got like a me I got diagnosed with breast cancer. I mean, I, I have preached for years on things that you can do about avoiding such diseases, and yet I got diagnosed anyways. But then on the flip side, I thought, well, thank God, I've done all these things, because it's the very reason why I've been able to thrive. On the other end of this, it's one of the reasons why I will be okay. And I will continue to live a super long life. And that's what really drives me. You know, like, I know, so many women that were diagnosed with breast cancer, and they were really felt like they were betrayed by their own bodies, you know, and they were very angry with their own bodies.

Jen Li: 8:57

And when you discover that cancer lump, you saw that this was an opportunity for you to make this big change. Were you were you on the brink of already feeling like a change was about to happen. And did that prepare you for something and like, I want to know how prepared you were for change that it's affecting, not just you, but also your your, your relationships

Mina: 9:24

leading up to? I don't know that I would say that. I was prepared in that sense, I think, well, in the one sense that I was prepared, was the fact that I been in the health space for like over 10 or 12 years at the point that I got diagnosed. So I in many ways, I'm like a holistic health expert. So the fact that I was like, You know what, this is what I was born to do. I know exactly who I need to talk to. I have So many resources available to me, I like, I'm going to research everything out the Yin Yang, I'm going to do my reading, I'm going to come prepared for all my doctor's appointments with like, a whole whack load of questions to the point that they gotta be sweating, by the time I'm done with them, you know, like, it's like, like, if, if cancer could have helped, could have hit anybody better, it couldn't have hit anybody better than me,

Unknown: 10:30

had gotten into it.

Jen Li: 10:32

Now, but

Mina: 10:34

in reality, in reality, I also had moments of like, I am dying, I'm going to die and like oh, my God, and waiting for test results. People don't realize that once you're diagnosed with breast cancer, you actually don't know how bad it is how far along it is, like, we know it's breast cancer, we don't know if it's spread, we don't know if it's stage one, or two, or three or four, we don't really end like oh, now it looks like it's spread a little bit. So you need to go under go further test to make sure it's not stage three or four. By the time that's all done, it's sometimes takes a few months, it's actually a really, really long process. So I would have moments waiting for a scan result to come back to find out if it spread all over my body. I'm like, I'm dead. It's everywhere. I know it, you know, like, I have absolute panic like this, right? So, you know, I want to be real. I wasn't always super women, you know. And I had absolute moments of panic. And that's, that's the life of every cancer patient ongoingly to today, as well. Anytime I feel a little inkling of something, I'm always wondering like, Oh, my gosh, is this cancer? Is it back? Has it spread? It's there, I continue to have scans ongoing Lee, who probably have some kind of scan for years and years to come. So it's always there.

Jen Li: 11:53

Yeah, no kidding, no kidding. Like, during those months of uncertain t around to the results, like just waiting for those results to come. It reminds me of many places where I've experienced in my relationships where I have to be really strong for the other person or, or vice versa. There's, there's a there's not a continuity, and a continuum for that people always have.

Mina: 12:26

I really want to talk to this about change, though, you know, this is a going back to when I was saying that, like the way I tackled cancer is I saw it as an opportunity. It was like that wake up call. So my life was at a certain trajectory. And like maybe this is going to have me really examine what's truly important to me, and to make certain changes. And I also really saw how resistant we are to change even if it's something little, like, should I change how I eat now?

Unknown: 12:58

Like,

Mina: 12:59

like, you know, I don't want to recurrent, should I be making changes to how I eat? And a lot of people have resistance to making changes to how they eat? Or, for example, should I be changing how I express myself? Or should I be changing, like how I, how I present myself to the world. And so this was like a really big, big wake up call for me to kind of make, like an inventory of what's really important to my life and make those changes.

Jen Li: 13:32

And,

Mina: 13:33

you know, a couple things that I really found for myself. One was, I've noticed that I don't express myself as freely as I could, you know, even if it's something little like let's say like, you know, you and I are having a conversation and you say something like maybe it could be a political statement. And maybe in the back of my head, I'm like, that doesn't feel right. And I'd be like, it's no big deal. And I'm having this like, like this conference with myself in my head as you're talking. And I would say nothing, I'd let it roll off my back. And I kind of noticed where I do that. And when I do that, and I've I've noticed that sometimes it could be like, it can even be something it's not about winning a conversation, either. It could be something as simple as like, Oh, I don't see things that way. Or that's not how I see things. You know,

Unknown: 14:26

and that's it.

Mina: 14:27

You know, that's all you need to say. And I've really noticed that about myself. And I've also noticed the little things that I did deny myself when it comes to pleasure. So something that I've really realized is I've really denied myself the pleasure of things, because sometimes I'd be like super practical and like, you know, it's no big just like that, just get it done. But sometimes I just take the moments to really have a pleasure in a certain thing like whether it's something I wear or something that I do or One thing that I eat, so I take that moment. And then finally, I really saw, I'm a very logical, very practical person. But I'm also like a closet woowoo girl, like, I'm closet, whoo, you could say, and I have a very strong intuitive side that I've really suppressed and haven't really honed in on. And I've noticed since my cancer diagnosis, I'm getting very good at listening to her, like really good at listening and understanding that I Wow, I have a lot of wisdom in there. And I just need to shut up long enough to listen to her. So those are the things that I've really grown as a result of my cancer diagnosis, and I had this thought this other day that like, what if a genie just appeared in my life and said, you know, Mina, I can take you back to that date before you ever had cancer. I can take and I can wipe out cancer so that, you know, you'd never know cancer in your life. And I swear to God, I thought, you know, if I had that opportunity, would I take it? And I don't think I would, because of the kind of person I've grown into as a result of all these years of self reflection and growth that I've done because of this diagnosis. Like that's a big price to pay.

Jen Li: 16:34

That is so powerful. Yeah, I I really felt that. Because I can feel how much cancer has helped you realize so much more deeply. And true, you are to yourself. And I want to ask you, for the people out there who are going through their their new circumstance in their life. 2020 2021 now has gone through some major changes, I want you to tell us how you built the confidence to own the new place that you have in your life with your new body, that was not a part of your plan. And for other people, if it was a new circumstance, that was not a part of their plan. What do you have to say to those people?

Mina: 17:23

Probably two things. So the first thing that I really, wow, that I really didn't expect. And it was a very powerful experience for me simple but powerful. So after I had my surgery for my bilateral mastectomy, I had a woman reach out to me saying, Hey, you know, I can start a meal train for you. So there's a webtrekk website out there called meal train. Yeah, I think it's called meal train calm, that's a website, you sign up for it. And she set it up and people can sign up on a certain day so that they can stop by your house to deliver meals for you.

Unknown: 18:04

And I

Mina: 18:05

honestly Honestly, I like I thought, okay, like, maybe two weeks, two weeks is good. And at that point, I'll be well enough to cook on my own. And it'd be a great, great, great help for my spouse as well. Like, he's fine. He does a lot of the cooking but this would would enable to take some of the load load off his plate as well. And my first thought was like, Okay, I'm going to post this on Facebook, this link to sign up and I was thinking in my head, I was like, no one's going to sign up. You know, but it took like, maybe two, three days and every single spot was filled. And I got to realize that if you just ask if you just ask people are dying to contribute to you. And not only did I just ask I also was on like this crazy diet at the time, I was not only keto, I was also vegan. So vegan keto, which is like the crazy hardcore thing. And

Jen Li: 19:06

I am vegan. And I know exactly, exactly what keto is that is next level. Okay,

Mina: 19:13

exactly. It's so next level. And so it was in the meal train instructions that I am currently eating vegan keto, which means I'm eating this, this, this this, I'm not eating this, this, this this. And like, No, none of my friends are vegan keto, like none of them know how to cook like that. And they all brought me vegan keto meals. So that's the other thing is to be like, I'm actually responsible for how other people show up in my life. So it's kind of like if I really give people clear instructions. You know, give people clear instructions. That this this is how you can support me, they will do it. So as opposed to like if if You know, there were no instructions and people brought me like, I don't know, chicken wings and a pizza, then I'd be like, why is everybody just just everybody? And then they'd be like, could you imagine? I'd be like, does everybody want me to die? You know, but no, it's because I wasn't responsible for how you can support me. And you can do that not in physical things, but emotional ways. Like, maybe this is how you could support me. You can support me my, by not private messaging me, like, every time I do a fake Facebook post, please do not private message me with like medical advice, unsolicited medical advice, because that stresses me the crap out, right? So be responsible for that, you know, I actually saw somebody make a post on the passing of one of his relatives, and he said, I am atheist. And I don't believe in an afterlife. So please do not make any reference to that. And I thought that is so.

Jen Li: 21:00

So responsible. Yeah, just say, you know that most of us would just say, you know, Mickey, Mickey, he's in a better place now. Like, we'll just most of us will say that. So it's kind of like, this is what I really learn. I'm like, wow, if you I just ask and give people clear instructions on how you can support me people are dying to be able to contribute. So that's a really great lesson I learned, oh, you can't put that any better. Like, and that also goes to show there are people out there who who feel like they don't feel like they deserve any support, or they or the people just just don't care. And it's not just that maybe you get a message from your mom in the way that that isn't supportive, so to speak. And you just haven't been responsible to idea that I haven't been responsible by telling her what it is. I actually need to feel supported. That is so powerful.

Unknown: 21:59

Yes. I,

Mina: 22:03

I used to say I love change. Like I love trying a new restaurant every time so in my mind is like I love change. But if you but one thing I love to do, oh one thing I love to do, I love to complain how tired I am. Okay, you would never know this about me because I'm usually very energetic. But when with Okay, would not be able to tell that slide to turn it on. But I swear to God, when I come off this call, I'd be like, I need a nap. Yo.

Unknown: 22:33

I'm like,

Mina: 22:34

so tired. Like, it's something that I've struggled with my whole life. And so if someone said to me, Mina, you need to stop complaining that you're tired. I'd be like, Oh, that's hard. Okay, so change, when it comes to those things are so hard. And I think, you know, some of us love to suffer. Right? And if you ask someone to stop suffering, that is so hard. This is why this is why we don't tell people how to support us. And so they say stupid stuff to us. And then I just love to suffer.

Jen Li: 23:15

Okay. And so

Mina: 23:18

like, so it is an ongoing process to be able to change those habits. But I'm not like talking about habits like yeah, brushing your teeth or taking a shower. I'm talking about like those deep rooted habits. Those are hard. And that's not something that can be done in 21 days. But it's like, the way we think it's so hardwired into our brain. And so like that is something that I struggle with, like those kinds of habits, because I'm just so tired. I'm so tired, right? Yes.

Jen Li: 23:50

It's like convincing ourselves like that is us. That is what I do. I just feel tired or I I eat after before I go to bed. That's what I do. That's what I do.

Mina: 24:00

Yeah. Yeah. So I think it's an ongoing process. I think it's like a lifelong commitment. It's a lifelong commitment. And it's always about understanding that you are probably trying to undo neural brain waves and patterns that have been inside your body since birth. So it's okay if you don't get it in like a couple of weeks. But it's that that is a process that I will probably work on forever.

Unknown: 24:34

Forever.

Jen Li: 24:35

Do you think cancer helped helped you helped you accept new changes better in your life? Oh, that's a great question.

Mina: 24:49

Well, I think you know, I wouldn't say that cancer alone did that. cancer was like the springboard to have me explore things that I put on the backburner for too long. So for example, you know, I've always wanted to explore feminine energy, I've always wanted to explore intuition. I've always wanted to explore mindfulness. But these were things I just kind of put on the back burner, because life got in the way. But now, like cancer happens, that's like, and then it got really loud, like me know, you, like, no, you're not putting this on the back burner, you're gonna make this a priority. So, so for example,

Unknown: 25:34

I did

Mina: 25:37

several, several courses since then. And one of them had to do with meditating. So I've done actually different kinds of meditation. And what it really helped for me was, I would learn something every single time. And I just felt like, you know, one particular aspect of meditation, which I'm, I'm not sure if you're familiar with I did the pasta a couple of years ago,

Jen Li: 26:03

very nice, which is a powerful, powerful

Mina: 26:06

experience, like, it's 10 days, 10 days of silence, and you can't even really do nonverbal communication either is you can't really wave at people. And you have to wear drab clothes, and you like meditate on average, about 10 hours a day. And you're like, it was kind of crazy. And I remember on day four, during a break, I had a tea in one hand and a banana in another. And I was bawling my eyes out. I was like, all by myself outside, like, like this, and I'm sure people notice, but they can't comfort me or even, like, really pay me any attention. And I remember thinking, like, I signed up for a meditation, torture camp, and I will die here. Like having this thought, right. But it was just like, funny side on my experience there. But what I came out of that was, understand that nothing lasts forever. Nothing lasts forever. Suffering does not last forever, it comes and goes, as does joy. It comes and goes, as does life itself. So I you know, how that really helped me was that the all this stuff that I'm going through with cancer, it will pass. And even if I die, we will all die. You know, I don't know why this comes to a surprise to people, we will all die, you know, some of us will die sooner than others. And I realized, you know what, we're all gonna die eventually. And some of us will die. Yeah, at moments that we don't expect. But like, why is this a surprise? Like, we will all die. So that really helped me understand, to accept this idea of what's called impermanence. So in kind of, like, you know, going back to your question does help me accept change more? It's like, well, things change constantly. This is how it is we, we can be responsible for how we perceive our life. But we will all die. This will all be like a million years from now we will be a blip. You suffer me?

Jen Li: 28:20

Forever, right? Yeah. And so. So once I go into my hope

Mina: 28:27

anything's possible, right? Once, then we can make it happen, you know, but that's, that's kind of what I would say, I don't know so much. I wouldn't say cancer. No, you know, I wouldn't say cancer helped me accept change. I will say that I took responsibility for what this event will mean, for me, I took actionable steps in order for me to make this an opportunity for growth, because it could have swung the other way. I could have been bitter, I could have been angry. And, and for me to just live in fear for the rest of my life for the rest of my life, that this cancer will come back, this cancer will come back, why should I bother? I'm going to die anyways. So I will probably say that it was intentional. And I use this as an opportunity to grow for the better.

Jen Li: 29:24

Well said, I mean, that is so so so good. So good. Cancer did not just happen to you, you happened and you created, it actually just revealed a choice for you, if any, and you created a So you saw that choice to to take over and be able to let go. And I think part of the toughest thing about being human is the changes that come with us. As we age and as we transform through our lives through through our societies and the changes that goes on. Letting Go is one of the hardest things for people to do. So you are absolutely an amazing example of someone who's been able to rock an 18 year old relationship, conquer cancer twice and stand on your own two feet saying that this is because I was supposed to responsible in the biggest way. And I hope that people can be inspired by your message. Tell us where people can find you Amina. You will find me on thick girl rich girl on Instagram. Awesome. Thank you so much, Mina. We appreciate you a lot. It's an absolute pleasure. Thank you, Jen.