Some conversations stop you in your tracks — this is one of them. My guest Nerissa Balland was five months pregnant via IVF when she was diagnosed with metastatic melanoma. What she did next and who she became because of it is the kind of story that reminds you what's actually important.

In this episode, we're talking about what happens when life forces you to reevaluate everything. Nerissa Balland is a two-time cancer survivor, artist, author of Canvas of Courage, and arts and health practitioner who helps people process adversity through creativity. After nearly two decades in marketing and advertising for brands like Amex and Pepsi, a cancer diagnosis while pregnant changed everything and eventually led her to a completely different life.

We talk about:

• Being diagnosed with metastatic melanoma five months into an IVF pregnancy and being told to terminate
• Why adversity doesn't have to be cancer to force a reckoning with yourself
• How creativity (not just therapy) can help us process what words can't reach
• The difference between choosing a safe path out of wisdom vs. choosing it out of fear
• What 100 interviews with young mothers facing cancer taught Nerissa about resilience
• Her arts and health workshops and why "broken crayons still color"
• Reinventing yourself at 40 when your identity was tied to your career

Whether cancer has touched your life or not, this conversation is for any woman in midlife who's wondering who am I now — and what's actually worth holding onto.

• Book: Canvas of Courage by Nerissa Balland
• Website and Free Guide HERE
• Follow her on Insta HERE