My founder story - I started Move & Mend not because I liked dance, but because I was too late to save my mum.

My story is deeply intertwined with my mum's cancer journey. I have been holding back from sharing this for a long time, partly because I couldn't find the words for it, or it may be too raw for the world to see. But this is life, raw as it is. I've been thinking a lot about mum recently, almost like a sign to get me to tell this to the world. So here it is, read on only if you feel resourced.

I recently spoke to more founders, and one of them asked me about my founder story — few people ever asked. I guess most people just assumed I liked dance, so I do dance therapy and dance. Acroyoga seemed fun, and I get to train with my husband — so lucky me.

But the truth is far beyond that. Even today, I feel misunderstood when my dad introduces me as a "dance teacher because I like to dance" — the same thing he said at my mum's funeral. That's an oversimplification. But it was only recently that I found words for it and it's linked to mum's cancer journey. I'm gasping through tears as I write this. Letting the body just be, I guess it's telling me something: I'm not moving on without her. She's lending me her energy, to speak aloud, to share OUR story. So here it goes.

My mum's passing taught me these about the body: It first whispers, then it nags, then it forces a stop. Mum was a fighter — always pushing, always giving — and then one day we got the diagnosis: stage 4 cancer. We were told she had six months left. My internal world shattered. I needed to drop everything, right then. So I quit my job at child protection and started working in the family business, standing in for mum. Dad and I also spent time learning Xing Bu Gong from my former primary school teacher, himself a stage 4 cancer survivor. We did everything we could.

At the cancer clinic, I chanced upon a book called Yoga for Cancer. I remembered that both yoga and dance movement therapy had been studied for cancer symptom relief — multiple randomized controlled trials show yoga can meaningfully reduce fatigue, sleep disturbance, and psychological distress in cancer patients, and a Cochrane review found moderate-quality evidence supporting yoga for quality of life, mental health, and cancer-related symptoms in women with breast cancer (Moadel et al., 2007; Vadiraja et al., 2009; Cramer et al., 2017). Regular movement like yoga is also linked to measurably lower cancer risk in the first place — large population studies have found consistently active people have roughly 10–20% lower risk across several cancers, including breast, colon, and endometrial cancer (Inoue et al., 2008; World Cancer Research Fund/American Institute for Cancer Research [WCRF/AICR], 2018).

Can I use this to help and "cure" mum? Am I too late? I probably am, but this was my one and only chance.

So in my transition into the caregiver role, I dived into a yoga teacher training, hoping to learn tips for "yoga for cancer." It gave me an anchor, and I pulled my mum into some practice with me, but I didn't have the expertise to tailor it to her condition. Cancer was too big, too much for me to catch up on.

It was around the same time that I got back my offers for dance therapy — one for a master's (in Derby, London), one for a diploma (hybrid model with DTNZ). I remember wanting to travel so badly, but the thought of missing time with my mum was simply too scary, so I opted for the diploma that let me spend much more time with her.

As I started understanding yoga and dance therapy, I remember asking myself, "Mum, will you be my success story? Can you be part of this miracle?" My dad, too, bought more and more energy-healing equipment to "heal" my mum. He spent nights digging into manuals and research papers looking for something that worked, while I spent nights resenting him for not spending quality time with her instead. Part of me reckoned we couldn't win this war, but he lived in hope of recovery — in denial of the impending, ignoring whatever signs her body was showing.

Did we succeed? Yes and no. Six months turned into a year, as mum experienced a significant reduction in cancer markers. I remember asking myself, have we won against cancer? My mum had bouts of energy and focus, but would crash drastically. She also experienced many infections, lots of discomfort and side effects, and soon after that first year, her condition worsened drastically. Her liver stopped working and her stomach bloated so badly. Nurses in the ward looked at her pitifully, but the oncologist remained hopeful, till the last day. Then I realised, it had been two years… four times the original prediction. We'd maxed out our bargain for time.

October 2022, I continued to participate in Converge studio's instructor item, ironically, in denial. But on day 1 of show day, I got a call from dad, right before the last full run — mum is calling for me. I dropped everything and rushed to the hospital. I looked at her, her eyes already unfocused, not knowing which side of hers I was standing on, but she smiled, in delight. She wanted to see Junior (our dog) too, but couldn't. Everyone came down, thankfully. That night, she passed on. My brother stayed back with her and called me in the middle of the night — all I heard was murmurs, beeping sounds. "Ma, thank you… I love you… I love you…" I said. How limited are our words.

Throughout those two years, many thoughts came to mind — thoughts I did not dare share with anyone because they "foretold" her departure, or placed blame on me or someone. But I felt so lonely while anticipating grief alone. I hoped the doctors would have prepared us more for her departure, so we could "organise" ourselves better, so we could say the words and do the hugs we should have given her much earlier. I remember vividly trying to attend a work webinar on my phone while pushing her wheelchair for a walk in the hospital garden, and that was caught by Popo and my cousin, with looks of disappointment. How could I have done that? How I wish I'd dropped my phone and simply been present, for our last few walks.

But in the first place, what did we do as a family, to let her be taken by cancer at the young age of 58? I remember feeling paralysed as I watched her suffer so many types of physical pain — how I wished I could relief that suffering and transfer some of that pain into my body. But the body doesn't work like money - our bodies are ours to bear - no one could take away even 1% of that pain. There's also something I once heard in a webinar — that people who get cancer are often the kindest, because they take on the pain of everyone around them.

Even without it being proven science, this resonated so deeply with me — because it was true of my mum. She often stayed up late for me to come back from my dance practices, sat on my bed to watch me finish my homework in the wee hours, woke up early to prepare breakfast every morning for six years of primary school. Always worried about the worst that could happen to me. Always brushing her own stress and pain off. My parents never talked about how they felt about anything. It was always about the next project, event, or appointment of someone in the family. We hardly had time for vacations because clients were priority; I had so much difficulty pulling everyone together for a family outing after primary school. She always had digestion issues, little to no exercise, ate loosely, had knee problems, poor sleep… and, in hindsight, anxiety for me, my brother, my dad, and hardly ever about herself. These were hardly reciprocated, and instead they were received as nagging, and probably added stress. She hardly received or left anything for herself. She never confided in me even as I got older, even in her last few days when I tried to talk about her last wishes, and about death. We couldn't find the words for it. I remember crying alone beside her on multiple nights — just out of desperation and fear of the impending death — but we connected only lightly, side by side, in her sleep. Or maybe she wasn’t yet asleep, but didn't know how to respond either.

I envisioned doing a DMT session with my mum and aunt, who's also a cancer survivor (in relapse), but I never did. I thought it would feel so awkward to start talking about the body, about sensations, with my family — something I could do easily with others. So I only did one with my grandma and her neighbours, using the excuse of my practicum. It was one-off, and it was awkward, and of course I could see smiles on their faces, but no one could verbalise any sensation about the body, having spent years muting them.

In my family, there was no such thing as a "body." It was merely a tool, a transport device that got us to places. But as my practice deepened, I realised there was nowhere else to go. Home is where the body is — however many countries we travelled, whomever we met, it remembers, and it is rich as it is; it holds information and truth for us to discover. It is in simple interactions like holding hands, or hugs with a loved one, or mindful breathing, that our body refuels itself. I was lucky that my husband found acroyoga for us, where I could simply rest in his support, and yet hold myself up — doing my part, knowing that others are doing theirs too. These moments, in the body, in connection with something or someone greater than us, are simply beautiful. Moments of mindful meditation also gave me a pause amidst the many demands of modern life — a pause that research links to lower cortisol, reduced perceived stress, and clearer decision-making (Pascoe et al., 2017, meta-analysis on mindfulness and physiological stress markers; Jacobs et al., 2013, Health Psychology, Shamatha Project, UC Davis)… oh, all the things that ‘cause’ cancer (i.e. chronic stress happens to be linked to many of the same inflammatory pathways researchers study in relation to cancer).

This discovery — the importance of living in the body, instead of using the body — was practised way too late in my family. How I wish I could turn back time to tell my mum, thank you, I love you… simply spend time looking into her eyes, talking about feelings, little wins in life, simply doing things beside her, exercising with her, making something special for her birthday to tell her "辛苦了，妈咪，爱你哦！真厉害，谢谢你!"

To anyone still here with me on this post — this is my story. Not one that I chose, but one I live by. I was too late to be my mum's miracle; I couldn't make her my success story. But I hope I can create spaces for more people to learn my lesson early. To begin to live in the present, for us and for the people we love.

The only constant in our lives is our bodies — whatever we do to it, it remembers; whatever we do to thank and appreciate it, it takes in. Ignore it for long enough, it makes a statement. Practices like qi gong, mindfulness, yoga, and of course dance therapy are practices we can start to develop, to connect deeply with our bodies, to heal, and to realise whatever they have gone through on our behalf. In all of them, we'll find movement — this primal modality that marks "life." Dance movement therapy researcher Sabine Koch and colleagues have found dance/DMT interventions to have small but significant positive effects on wellbeing, depression, and anxiety across dozens of controlled studies (Koch et al., 2019, Frontiers in Psychology) — echoing what pioneering dance therapists have said for decades - the body is the only means we have to experience life and respond to it. As dance therapist Nana Koch said, “The spark of life began with a movement”, and our invitation is to engage in this movement, with all our presence.

That's why I offer dance therapy sessions — to make such mindful movement practices available to more people, for us to hone in to the messages from our bodies, to create pauses for connection within ourselves and with others, before it is too late. That's my founder story, the long answer to this simple question.

References

• Moadel, A. B., et al. (2007). Randomized controlled trial of yoga among a multiethnic sample of breast cancer patients: effects on quality of life. Journal of Clinical Oncology, 25(28), 4387–95.

• Vadiraja, H. S., et al. (2009). Effects of yoga on symptom management in breast cancer patients: a randomized controlled trial. International Journal of Yoga, 2(2), 73–79.

• Cramer, H., et al. (2017). Yoga for improving health-related quality of life, mental health and cancer-related symptoms in women diagnosed with breast cancer. Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews.

• Pascoe, M. C., et al. (2017). Mindfulness mediates the physiological markers of stress: systematic review and meta-analysis.

• Jacobs, T. L., et al. (2013). Self-reported mindfulness and cortisol during a Shamatha meditation retreat. Health Psychology.

• Koch, S. C., Riege, R. F. F., et al. (2019). Effects of dance movement therapy and dance on health-related psychological outcomes: a meta-analysis update. Frontiers in Psychology.

• On the "cancer personality" myth: large cohort studies (Japan, ~30,000 participants; Denmark, Danish Cancer Society; France, GAZEL cohort, ~13,800 participants) found no association between personality traits and cancer incidence.

• Inoue, M., Yamamoto, S., Kurahashi, N., Iwasaki, M., Sasazuki, S., & Tsugane, S., for the Japan Public Health Center-based Prospective Study Group. (2008). Daily total physical activity level and total cancer risk in men and women: Results from a large-scale population-based cohort study in Japan. American Journal of Epidemiology, 168(4), 391–403. https://doi.org/10.1093/aje/kwn146

• World Cancer Research Fund/American Institute for Cancer Research. (2018). Diet, nutrition, physical activity and cancer: A global perspective. Continuous Update Project Expert Report 2018. https://www.wcrf.org