Describe a significant experience that has happened in the past year. How did it affect you? Are you grateful? Relieved? Resentful? Inspired?

I got married!!!!!!! It affected me greatly as I now have my best friend as my husband till death us do part. It was honestly the best day of my life, I love him so much and can’t wait to spend many many happy years together as mr & Mrs.

Over the past 7 weeks I have been undergoing tests to check for potential lymphoma. On Friday I was told that there were "no signs of cancer" in my biopsy. The uncertainty around the potential diagnosis (and the implications of being diagnosed) caused huge anxiety. While work has been a welcome distraction (and enabled me to occasionally forget the worry), there have been moments of intense introspection around what I would want to do if my life suddenly became more imminently time-limited (drawing/painting every day as a record of my physical and emotional journey). I have also been thinking about how I would want to be remembered, what I would want a funeral to look like (a massive dinner party with good food). The relief of being given the all-clear allows the potential to go back to normal, but it provides the opportunity of perspective--if I would do things differently if my life was more time-limited, then why would I not do that anyway? Our lives are all time-limited, after all.

I bought my first house. It's a goal I have been working towards for about a decade, so while the actual deal went down fast, it was a long time coming. The house itself is everything I was hoping for, and I see my future in it. So while I am a little stressed at the moment, I am so happy we live here.

A student came to me after his best friend died. We talked about grief, death, love and loss for many hours over several weeks. I don't know if I helped him, or if it was just the passage of time, but to be trusted with something so personal, to be thought of as someone who he could talk to... It made me feel like I must be doing something right.

I have made steps towards reconciling with my father after a 14 year period. I feel less angry now, although it’s still painful and hard to get past the way in which he left my mother and divorced her. I am somewhat relieved, but still upset at times. We’ll never get back to a normal relationship- but these are baby steps.