Three Years in CRC

Whatever you do, do it from the heart, as something done for the Lord and not for people.

Colossians 3:23
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Today marks three years since I officially started working as a researcher for the big cancer project of my home lab, the Disease Molecular Biology and Epigenetics Laboratory or DMBEL.

Cancer. The big C. Some say it used to be the Big C. Being one of the hottest topics of research in molecular biology in the past few decades, a lot has since been known about this taboo class of diseases: how it works, how to detect it early, and how best to treat it.

To be sure, a cancer diagnosis is still one of the most frightening things that can happen to a person in their lifetime. It is still one of the leading causes of mortality worldwide. And there will always be a stigma around cancer as long as people are dying from it.

People live and people die. Suffering is a fact of life. And so to be given the chance to work on a project with the ultimate goal of helping those who are suffering from this terrible disease is a privilege, a gift, but also a great responsibility. And one that I have done my best not to waste. To use it well.

It has not been easy, especially the first two years of juggling this job with graduate school. But every day I learn something and grow from each experience, and that's something I am thankful for.

Being chest-deep in assays, staring at cells all day long, troubleshooting experiments and then crunching data afterwards can burn you out or leave you asking if this is worth the hassle at all. On the other hand, creating figures for publications and conference presentations can be exciting (it is for me), but it always leaves me thinking if it has any real impact to the world at all. Science without humanity is one of the seven dangers to human virtue after all.

It gets real once the words cancer, tumor, and metastasis stops being just a term that you normally use in the lab. Once it knocks on a friend's door. On your household's door, even. This year, it got real for me.

I can only hope that the work I have accomplished here for three years will serve some real purpose. To Filipino colorectal cancer patients, to the future scientists of this country, to anyone.

But that will be up to God.

I trust that wherever I am headed next after this will only be for the best.
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For I am confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus.

Philippians 1:6