Scared to Death

This manuscript is an autoethnographic study in which the author explores her struggles with death anxiety throughout her life. In order to gain a deeper understanding of her experiences, the author connects her personal narrative to scholarly data on death anxiety, bereavement, cancer diagnosis and recovery, and ¿wounded healers.¿ The author offers a detailed account of her experiences with death including the death of her grandfather as a child, her own thyroid cancer diagnosis as a young adult, and how her diagnosis interacted with her fears of death post-recovery. Within this book, the author seeks to comprehend how her fears of death, cancer diagnosis, and recovery will influence her work as a therapist. By offering her personal narrative, the author¿s aim is to be a companion to others who endure similar struggles with death anxiety or an illness and to help others gain a deeper understanding of what it feels like to live through death anxiety and a cancer diagnosis. This book will be a resource for counsellors, psychologists, doctors, and other healthcare professionals, as well as others who wish to support someone who experiences death anxiety or a life-threatening illness.