Tracey McKee, a familiar voice to CJAD 800 listeners, is working on bringing her experiences with her battle with cancer to the stage.
"How crazy is that?" McKee, between bursts of laughter, told CJAD 800's Ken Connors on the Sunday morning show McKee occasionally hosts as a fill-in. "But yes, I am writing a play, a one-woman show...about my experience since my diagnosis with triple-negative breast cancer which was in August 2017."
Following her diagnosis, she spent the next several months undergoing treatments, and writing about her experiences in a blog called In The Pink. Her new project, she says, is drawn in part from the reaction to her blog.
"I received through that a lot of feedback," she says. "And the feedback that has meant the most to me was the feedback that I got from complete strangers that either had a loved one going through breast cancer treatment, or they themselves were going through breast cancer treatments."
McKee says many of those who wrote back to relay their own experiences with undergoing cancer treatments say they just want to forget about the treatments once they're done. But McKee, who's spent much her life in the communications business in one form or another, is taking a decidedly different approach.
"I really feel that there's power in shared experience, and making people feel that they're not alone."
McKee says she's written "only about a solid eight minutes" of her production, but she says her blog will give her a lot to work with.
"The harder part is looking at how to structure it," McKee said. "How do I make this into something that's palatable for the audience?"
McKee, who's now in remission, says she wants her production to be a positive, optimistic one. She's shooting for a Nov. 8 opening.