Shortly after Yael Cohen’s mother was diagnosed with breast cancer, Cohen realized that there was no community for women to ask questions, talk to other patients and survivors, or find a way to ease the terror and panic most felt at hearing those dreaded words.
So, the 25-year-old Vancouver, B.C. resident decided to make one, through social media.
Three years later, she’s the developer of letsfcancer.com, a Facebook page, and a Twitter account; had a live chat with Scott Herbert of mashable.com; was chosen as one of the 100 most creative people in business by fastcompany.com; won $25,000 in the Mozilla Firefox Challenge, and hopes to spread the word about another word people don’t really want to talk about.
Yes, the “f” stands for another word that we can’t print here, but she said in an interview that shows her passion for the cause.
Everything actually started with a t-shirt that spelled out what later would become the website, and Cohen’s attitude toward cancer. “When my mom got diagnosed, I made a t-shirt with those words and it was the most shocking thing how people responded, we got high fives, and hugs – all this from total strangers. I realized people wanted to tell their story.”
Somehow the t-shirt, worn in public by others (her mom only wore it in private), “led people to be brave and vulnerable, be something they didn’t know they could,” said Cohen. “It’s unbelievable how it brings barriers down. People are super-uncomfortable with cancer.”
Cohen set up her community and now her Facebook page has been “friended” by 6,300 people, has over a million hits on her website, and helped people who were very worried, and even hopeless, connect with each other.
“The battle is early detection,” Cohen said. “Ninety percent of cancers are curable if caught at Stage 1.” Her goal is to get young women like herself to become knowledgeable about detection at an early age.
“They can teach their parents, and through teaching them, they teach themselves,” Cohen said.
But Cohen didn’t want to go the usual route of handing out pins and brochures. With her fast, breezy style, she’s created easy, convenient and, dare we say it, fun ways to find out what’s going on in – and connect with – the cancer world.
Since her organization is not research-oriented, like almost all other cancer outreach efforts, she’s created her own niche, and young (and older) women are flocking to her online community.
“Everyone feels guilty, or confused, talking about cancer. I wanted to teach people how to talk to each other about it in a more meaningful way than society has. How are you doing? Do you need anything? How are you and your husband coping with this?”
Three years later, Cohen’s mother is doing fine, and so is her charity and online community. “We needed a space for people to see what we were about, and for the community – whether to learn or share, or just need a safe space – to congregate, and collectively exhale,” she said.
Edited by
Brooke Neuman
