An oncologist’s reflection on the emotional and spiritual earthquake that follows a cancer diagnosis, and why self-awareness is the first medicine no prescription can provide.
The word “cancer” rarely arrives as a shout. It comes as a whisper, a quiet unsettling sound that lingers long after the consultation room falls silent. I have watched hundreds of patients receive this word over years of practice as a medical oncologist. And I can tell you with certainty: nothing fully prepares a person for that moment.
Not education. Not faith. Not even the suspicion that something was wrong.
In my book Between Science and the Soul, I begin with this very moment. Not to dramatize it, but to honour it. Because how we understand the first hours after a cancer diagnosis can shape the entire healing journey that follows.
The World Shifts in an Instant
A schoolteacher named Meera came to my clinic in her forties. Her life had a comfortable rhythm: classrooms, family dinners, evening prayers. The day she heard her diagnosis, she described it as if “someone had suddenly switched the lens through which I saw the world.” The grocery list in her bag, the half-finished lessons on her desk. All of it seemed unreachably distant.
What struck me about Meera was not her fear. It was what followed the fear. She said: “Doctor, I never realised how much I took my body for granted. Now, every heartbeat feels like a message from God.”
That shift from taking life for granted to recognising it as precious is the seed of self-awareness. And self-awareness, I believe, is the first medicine in cancer care that no prescription can provide.
Three Waves That Hit Every Patient
The emotional storm comes first. I have seen patients break into tears, some fall into complete silence, and others cling to denial for weeks. A retired army officer named Suresh, a man who had faced bullets in combat, sat across from me and whispered: “Doctor, I don’t know how to fight this one.” His breakdown was not a weakness. It was the collapse of an identity built on invincibility. Cancer does not just attack cells. It shakes who we believe we are.
Then comes the spiritual earthquake. Many patients ask: “Why did God choose me?” I have no straight answer. But I recognise the depth of hurt behind that question. A mother named Neelam sobbed in my clinic: “I prayed every day, Doctor. Why did God not listen?” Her spiritual breakdown was as real as her medical one. Yet I have also seen how this questioning, painful as it is, becomes the opening to a deeper and more honest faith.
And finally, the question that every patient eventually asks: “What now?”
What I Have Learned from the Other Side of the Table
One patient, Arun, was diagnosed in his thirties and asked, “Why me?” for months. Slowly, he stopped searching for the answer and started living the question differently. He began spending more intentional time with his young children. He told me: “I don’t know why this happened. But I know what I can do. I can love them more deeply while I have the chance.”
That transformation, from “Why me?” to “What can I do with this?”, is one of the most profound shifts I witness as an oncologist. It doesn’t happen overnight. It happens in tears, in prayer, in moments of despair, and in surprising moments of laughter too.
The First Step No One Tells You About
Before treatment plans, before second opinions, before the research spiral at 2 a.m., I suggest something simpler to my patients: Begin by noticing yourself. Listen to your breath. Feel your emotions. Allow yourself to simply be present with what is happening.
This small act of awareness softens fear. It creates space for faith, whether that faith lives in prayer, in family, in medicine, or simply in the steady presence of someone who sits with you without rushing.
Science will guide the treatment. Awareness will guide the soul. Together, they create a healing far greater than a cure alone.
This article is inspired by Chapter 1 of Between Science and the Soul: An Oncologist’s Reflections on Faith, Fear, and the Fight Against Cancer by Dr Vedant Kumar Modi. Published by Pen and Paper Publication, India (2025). ISBN: 978-81-993593-3-8.
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