Setbacks are a part of life—but during and after breast cancer treatment, they can feel especially discouraging. Whether it’s a physical flare-up, emotional overwhelm, or an unexpected roadblock, these moments can leave you feeling helpless, frustrated, or like healing is slipping out of reach.

In this episode of Better Than Before Breast Cancer, we talk about five powerful steps you can take when you’re faced with yet another setback. You’ll learn how to regain your sense of control, avoid the emotional spiral that comes with unexpected challenges, and approach setbacks with more clarity, compassion, and resilience.

This episode is for you if:

• You’re feeling weighed down by recurring obstacles during recovery

• You tend to internalize setbacks or blame yourself when things go wrong

• You want tools to stay grounded and emotionally balanced when life gets hard

• You’re ready to respond to life’s challenges without losing hope or momentum

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Read the full transcript:

0:01
This is Laura Lummer, the breast cancer recovery coach. I'm a healthy lifestyle coach, a clinical or Aveda specialist, a personal trainer, and I'm also a breast cancer survivor. In this podcast, we talk about healthy thinking and mindfulness practices, eating well, moving your body for health and longevity. And we'll also hear from other breast cancer survivors who have reengaged with life, and have incredible stories to share. This podcast is your go to resource for getting back to life after breast cancer.

0:37
Welcome to Episode 49 of the breast cancer recovery coach. I am your host, Laura Lummer. And today we're going to talk about five steps to managing setbacks. Now before we get into that, I just want to say thank you so much for listening to the breast cancer recovery coach for subscribing for downloading, I have just come off several hours of taping videos for the review of the five program. And getting to have the opportunity to do that is such a fulfilling experience for me that on this podcast and starting it off, I just want to say I love my job, I love my work. I love getting to support you. I love getting to hear from you. I love reaching out with anything that I can do to make the experience of recovering from breast cancer easier and more joyful for everybody who listens. So thank you for all of your support. And thank you for being that part of making my dream come true allowing me to do the work that I do. It's really, really fabulous. And I love it. Thank you so much. So I want to talk today about setbacks. And something that brought this up was is a situation that I am dealing with now. And as I am dealing with this situation, you know, there's a tendency to say free in cancer, right? Dean cancer, all of this is the result of cancer. Okay, well, there comes a time where we just have to stop that blame game, look at the situation that's happening, deal with it. And even though that may be the root cause that doesn't really change anything or make it better. So in my surgical area, I've been having quite a bit of pain and just a change. And it's probably just a buildup of scar tissue. And I'm working with my doctor to check it all out. But it's frustrating because one of my favorite things to do is lift weights. And I work at a strength and conditioning gym, that workout I work out at a strength and conditioning gym. And I love it. And so because of this setback in my arm, I've had to change it a little bit change up my routine a little bit. And I don't like doing that. But the important thing is that I've been able to find a way to manage that, move through it and adjust my routine to accommodate for my setback, rather than just throwing out the baby with the bathwater and saying, Oh, this is uncomfortable. This doesn't feel good right now. And so I can't exercise at all, I can't get out. And damn cancer. Look what it's done to me still eight years later impacting my life. I mean, I could say that, but would that really serve me in any way? It really wouldn't. So, as I deal with this very minor setback, nothing major or serious, but it caused me to think about all the women that I work with, who do have to manage setbacks, and sometimes are very devastated by them. And these can come in the form of not just dealing with recovering from breast cancer, breast cancer, but also in trying to change up their nutrition plan, trying to manage their weight. There's all kinds of areas where we experience setbacks, right. And that's not something that's proprietary to us as cancer survivors. It's something that happens to every human being because life comes with setbacks. So we're going to talk about five ways to manage setbacks, so that they really aren't a roadblock to living, but you can face them, you can deal with them. And in the most constructive and positive way you can move forward through these setbacks without allowing them to take you down a deep, dark rabbit hole that you don't want to find yourself in. So let's start off with number one. The first thing that you can do is know that there will be setbacks. So number one is expect setbacks in whatever it is you're doing. Whether you're building a business, whether you're rebuilding your health, whether you're trying to get through treatment, there will be setbacks. So let me give you an example that I can go back to from my treatment and recovery.

5:00
My very first surgery was a lumpectomy. And I had decided on this surgery because my breast surgeon, my oncologist, everybody agreed that I was the perfect candidate, they could go in, they could get it out. And I could move on much faster and still have the same lowered risk as I would if I had a bilateral mastectomy. But I would have a lot less downtime. I was a single parent at the time with two children still living at home. And I didn't want to take that much time off of work. And you know, what we do as parents and you know, you want to be there and be the one that's taking care of everything for everybody. I've learned a lot since then. But look, that was eight years ago. So I decided to have lumpectomy went into surgery, woke up from the glory years sleep of anesthesia, and was told you've got to go to chemotherapy, cancer has spread to your lymph nodes.

5:55
That is not cool. So I went through chemotherapy. And guess what happened at the end of chemotherapy after I'd had my little heart set on the fact that that would be the last thing I would have to do.

6:06
I was told we still didn't get all the cancer, you've got to go back and have a bilateral mastectomy. Wow. Okay, another one another setback. Then I go through reconstruction. And I think I'm done with reconstruction. But I get an infection, a pretty bad infection. And it's a major setback. So I get through that infection and dang it. The implant slips out of the other side, back to surgery, stick the implant back up there. So it up. But with every surgery, there's downtime, there's recovery, right? So it's boom, boom, boom, one after the other. Now, I am not special. This is not special to me. Because I know you went through setbacks to what unusual is that someone goes through treatment and recovery without setbacks. That is special. That's the unicorn out there. But most of us sadly, don't get to be that sparkly unicorn. So it's important that we expect setbacks so that we can manage those setbacks, not so that we're pessimistic or thinking cynically or saying this thing won't work. So let's take in recovery, trying to create a healthy nutrition program. And you get yourself set on whatever it is that you decide to do whatever plan you decide to follow. And you're like, Yeah, I'm in, I'm going to do this, I'm going to make this happen. I've got a weight loss goal. And I'm in for this until those 20 pounds are gone. But then something comes up, whether it's a trip for work, or it's a birthday party, or it's a special date night or whatever, someone surprises you with the cheesecake, I don't know, something comes up. And that's okay, because that's what happens in life. Things come up all the time. But if you know that, hey, you know what, I'm going to do this plan. And I am going to shoot for 80% I'm not going to shoot for perfect, because I know perfect is not realistic. And so if someone shows up with my favorite red velvet cheesecake, I'm gonna have a couple of bites. And my next meal, I'm gonna go right back to the good way that I'm eating. And I'm not gonna beat myself up. And I'm not gonna say that I cheated because I didn't cheat. I just enjoyed life. And so then you don't look at it and say, Oh, great, I had a piece of red velvet cheesecake. Now I might as well go have a big plate of

8:42
spaghetti with Alfredo sauce or some other thing you know, but that happens a lot. People start a nutrition program. They say I messed up, or I screwed up, or I cheated. And then what's the point? I might as well go all in and it's a deep dive down the Ben and Jerry's tub ice cream. So when you're embarking on something, whether it's healing, or whether it's changing a part of your lifestyle routine, expect setbacks, and plan for them. Write it down, what will you do in this situation? Acknowledge to yourself that it won't be perfect. But when the setback comes up, this is what I'll do to manage it. If it's healing and recovering. If it's, Hey, I'm gonna go in for a lumpectomy. But I know that there's a chance that this may turn into something more. You don't have to think negatively about it. You can just say, hey, is someone helping me with the house with the kids? Is there this much sick time at work? How will I manage it? If worst case scenario happens, then it's not so stressful because you've got a backup plan. You've got a plan B and then it's not so devastating because you've acknowledged that there was potential that something might set you back. Step number two is set a time limit

10:00
On your emotional reaction. Now, you may think, what I can't decide how I ink. I don't know how it's going to impact me. But I am going to challenge that and say, Yes, you can. Now you may not be able to control the thoughts that pop up in your mind. But you can control which thoughts you latch on to and run with. So I'll give you again, a personal example of mine.

10:31
When I get a setback, when I come up to something that's very disappointing for me, I try to give myself I because I know I have to process it. And so I try to not take more than two days, I take two days to let it sink in, before I take any real action, let it sink in, let it process, let me cry, let me go to a boxing class and hit something and whatever it is that I need to do to get my emotions in check. And then that's when I stop and say, Okay, what's next?

11:10
What are my options? How can I manage this? How can I deal with this? And an important thing to do to get from the set of time on emotional reactions to the ask, what's next? Is that you take an honest look at the data. And you don't take the setback personally. And what that means is, when there's something like for instance, I wake up from surgery from a lobectomy to a doctor saying, Now you gotta go through chemotherapy, was I devastated? Heck, yeah. I didn't want my hair to fall out. And trust me, there was an emotional reaction behind that.

11:51
But at that point, I had to stop and say, Okay, what's the data here? What are my options? What am I looking at? What happens if I don't make this choice? What happens if I do make this choice?

12:04
But where you don't want to go to is what did I do to deserve this? Why is this happening to me, this is a victim mentality. And this is something that is not going to serve you when it comes to a setback. Now, if you took an action, that's part of that data, and you can look at and say, Okay, I made this action, I made this choice, and that resulted in this setback, then that's okay. Because that can be a part of your plan for what's next. So you expect setbacks, so that you can manage them, you set a time on your emotional reactions to that setback. And then you take an honest look at the data. And don't take it personally, you can take personal responsibility if your action was a part of it. But if your action wasn't a part of it, don't blame yourself, the universe isn't out to get you. This is just life in life throws setbacks at us all the time. Unless we're unicorns, which I would love to be, then we say what's next? So you've evaluated the data, you've looked at the truth of the situation, you've looked at the options that present themselves to you. And now you can say, What do I do next? So let's go back to the nutrition example. You've made a plan to change your nutrition, you've had a setback, you ate the cheesecake,

13:33
you took an honest look at the data and that data sets you Hey, 80% of the time, I'm doing great. And then I ate the cheesecake, which was my personal choice. So I accept responsibility for it. But I don't take it personally and beat myself up for it. I say this was a choice that I made. And I'm okay with that choice. So what do I do next, I make a better choice. At my next meal, I make a different choice at my next meal, I make a choice to go back and continue following the plan. I'm not starting at square one. I'm just continuing to go forward from a choice that I made to deviate. Let's say that that setback has nothing to do with a choice that you made. You woke up and someone said, you have to go through chemotherapy, you thought you were finished with breast cancer treatment. And now you've got horrible infection you're dealing with, what do you do next? What is the next step that you can take to move forward in managing the situation but still progressing towards the balance in your life that you want to achieve? Because we may not have control over what happens to us. But we do have control over our attitude towards it and the way that we handle it. It's like that Buddhist saying that pain is inevitable. But suffering is optional. What we put ourselves through in our mind is often far worse than the situation that's actually happening.

15:00
to us. And so it's really important when dealing with a setback that you're going through the steps of setting a time for the emotional reaction of taking an honest look at what's really happening, and not personalizing it as if you're the victim of a universal conspiracy, and of taking action and looking at what's next. Otherwise, we can get easily caught up in the victim language, this language of obsessing over what's actually happening to us. And that can even happen day by day, let's say that you're struggling with fatigue, or joint pain. And in your mind, or like, I'm so tired, I had this fatigue or my joints hurt all the time. This internalizing this type of language, actually is not helping you to overcome these challenges, the setbacks, when you recognize that this is what you're dealing with, the important thing is to take those steps and what is next? And that's not to say you can't say Oh, well, my joint hurts. But oh, gosh, my knee hurts today. Did I take the supplements I needed? Did I say? Did I rest enough? Did I walk too much? Did I wear the wrong shoes, looking at what's actually happening that's causing this helps you to move forward. Instead of getting stuck in a situation. That's the setback. And step number five, is you just want to take one day at a time and you want to give yourself the credit for what you've done in that day. So if you've gone through the steps, and you've processed what's happening, and you've established what you're going to do next, and you've really established that you've taken the time to evaluate what you have control of and what you can do, because hoping something's going to change or hoping something else will come along is not a plan. Alright, so what's next involves actions that you can actually take that are tangible steps. And if you've done all these things, then you got to give yourself time. And you've got to just take one day at a time in that process. So especially when it comes to changing a lifestyle, or when it comes to overcoming something like breast cancer treatment. It's just shocking to me how so often we expect our body to literally heal overnight, when someone goes through treatment and, or having a huge surgery, major surgery and a week later on, say I'm so frustrated, I can't do this. And I think, holy cow, your body was just literally cut open and pieces were taken out, or pieces were put back in. That's a huge, so you got to give yourself time. When you've got to take one day at a time in that process. You can't look forward and say oh my gosh, it's going to be this much time before anything changes. Or what if this doesn't get fixed by this time or that time. Just take one day at a time you do the things that you can control. When you're faced with a setback, you take the steps that are necessary. And then you come back to this moment. You enjoy your life right now as it is and you take one day at a time. But you acknowledge that you are doing everything that you can constructively and positively to manage the situation. So those are the five steps to managing setbacks in life and in recovery. Expect them so that you can manage them and plan for them. Set a time limit on your emotional reactions. take an honest look at the data and don't take it personally. Then ask what's next which you have control of the next step you can take. And then give yourself credit for these actions and just take it one day at a time. So setbacks will come my friend they will not stop. They're a part of life. But you can make them a manageable part of life. And when they come, you can create a plan so that they don't stop you from living your life. Okay, that's what I have for you today. I hope that helps you in some way. I want to remind you that re vivify is on sale for its introductory price just for oh, this is the time of this recording is July 21. So we've got 10 more days, and then the price will be going up and all the new materials and it will be released. So get in now while you can and you'll still get all the good stuff at the same price because you're in for life once you join me vivified. Thank you for listening to the breast cancer recovery coach. And remember to subscribe and take a moment to go to the iTunes Store and leave a review for the show so it makes it easier for other breast cancer survivors to find as well. I'll talk to you soon

19:58
to the test later.

20:00
In all your doubts

20:04
your mind is clearer than before your heart is full and wanting more your futures

20:15
Give it all you

20:18
know

20:20
you've been waiting on

20:27
this