Amy Austin returns to The Burn for a second visit. Amy was diagnosed with Stage IV de novo breast cancer at 34 after initially being misdiagnosed with a complex benign cyst.
In this episode Amy reads her poem “In Praise of Quiet Advocacy” from the 2024 “MBC: Advocacy” issue of Wildfire Journal. Her poem is about the role of “quiet” advocacy in supporting individuals living with metastatic breast cancer (MBC). April and Amy will discuss what quiet advocacy means, the importance of being seen and seeing other young breast cancer patients, and the impact of friendships when sharing an MBC diagnosis. Amy will also share how her poem came to be with the support of another MBC friend, and the writing prompts that are all around us.
Subscribe and Listen On…
More From The Burn
In this returning guest episode, today’s storyteller, Laurie Pomeranz, shares a vivid and surprising account of the day her metastatic recurrence was confirmed through a spinal biopsy. What unfolds is not only fear and dread, but humor, music, connection, and an unexpected act of kindness from her care team.
This conversation explores how patients experience medical procedures from the inside out, the power of levity in hard moments, and how small gestures of care can become unforgettable anchors inside life-altering news.
In this episode, today’s storyteller, Alyssa Tsagong, reflects on a decades-long friendship that grew into something she now calls kinship: a relationship rooted in truth, curiosity, and shared tending of body and spirit. After a metastatic diagnosis, that friendship became a place where fear could be spoken out loud and held without being fixed or minimized.
We talk about friendship as sacred work, building capacity for grief and joy at the same time, and how supportive relationships can be intentionally cultivated — not just relied upon — through practice, ritual, and presence.
In celebration of Pride Month, each Friday in June we’re re-sharing our favorite episodes featuring LGBTQ+ voices from the Wildfire community.
Emily Rau is an Assistant Professor of Digital Humanities at the University of Nebraska at Lincoln, and the editor of the Willa Cather Archive. In this episode Emily reads her essay “I Might Be in Love with All My Friends” from the 2023 “Love & Intimacy” issue of Wildfire. Emily’s story is about sensuality mixed in with a lot of milestones and steps in a breast cancer experience that we haven’t really heard before at Wildfire.
April and Emily will talk about why it was important to share a cancer story that folds into Emily’s queer and polyamorous life, honoring her grief in cancer, the role the polyamorous community played in Emily’s cancer journey and the fear of overtaxing people with our burdens. They will also discuss the prairie, and hear Emily beautifully explain the comfort and metaphor this particular landscape provided her in cancer. This episode contains explicit content about drugs and sex.
