{"id":609958,"date":"2026-05-29T08:26:13","date_gmt":"2026-05-29T08:26:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/609958\/"},"modified":"2026-05-29T08:26:13","modified_gmt":"2026-05-29T08:26:13","slug":"wilmington-woman-turns-cancer-battle-into-mission-to-help-others-navigate-mental-health","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/609958\/","title":{"rendered":"Wilmington woman turns cancer battle into mission to help others navigate mental health"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"text | article-text\">WILMINGTON, N.C. (WECT) &#8211; Five years ago, Catherine Hamilton\u2019s life looked a lot different. She was living in Ecuador and was running an international yoga school, but soon, everything changed.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cI was diagnosed in 2019 with breast cancer,\u201d Hamilton said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">She came back to Wilmington for treatment, but at only 30 years old, was told she\u2019d need surgery, chemo and radiation.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cAt 30 years old, you\u2019re going to bridal showers, and you\u2019re going to baby showers, and weddings, and I was just going through a completely different phase of life,\u201d Hamilton said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Her new reality came with more than doctors\u2019 appointments. Hamilton says she didn\u2019t have insurance and had to figure it out on her own. Constant fears about her health, her finances and her life were all part of crippling anxiety.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cIt\u2019s like oh my god\u2026it\u2019s just mental health that is a large part of the diagnosis,\u201d Hamilton said.<\/p>\n<p>Mental health impacts cancer care<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">And she\u2019s not alone. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cdc.gov\/cancer-survivors\/hcp\/mental-health-care\/index.html\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.cdc.gov\/cancer-survivors\/hcp\/mental-health-care\/index.html\">According to the CDC<\/a>, as many as three out of every four people with cancer experience symptoms of psychological distress or cognitive concerns, issues that can hurt overall well-being and health outcomes.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">That\u2019s what social workers like Alicia Sumner at Novant Health say they\u2019re watching for, because when someone is struggling mentally, it can start to affect their care. Missed appointments. Delayed follow-ups. Even skipped treatments.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">And Sumner says that\u2019s why having someone in your corner can make all the difference, someone who knows the system and knows what this feels like.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cWe\u2019re that one voice, that one person maybe that whole day they get to talk to \u2014 just because they feel comfortable\u2026 we do this on a daily basis,\u201d Sumner said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Hamilton is now cancer-free, and she\u2019s walking toward a career in social work, interning at the same place she once came for treatment, now helping patients navigate the uncertainty she knows firsthand.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cIt\u2019s every day you get to talk to someone who is going through different stress in their life, and then also on top of that they\u2019re experiencing a cancer diagnosis,\u201d Hamilton said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">With Sumner as her supervisor, they\u2019re making sure patients are being heard, so their mental health doesn\u2019t impact their road to recovery.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Hamilton is set to graduate with her Master of Social Work degree in August.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"WILMINGTON, N.C. (WECT) &#8211; Five years ago, Catherine Hamilton\u2019s life looked a lot different. She was living in&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":609959,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[44],"tags":[847,102,1906,34634,6623,207601,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-609958","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mental-health","tag-cancer","tag-health","tag-mental-health","tag-mental-health-awareness","tag-mentalhealth","tag-novant","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/609958","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=609958"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/609958\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/609959"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=609958"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=609958"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=609958"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}