The Show Must Go On

By Tara DeLorenzo

Looking to spread positivity and connect people with her story, three-time metastatic cancer survivor/ thriver Olivia Summer Hutcherson has been sharing her experience through her poetry book The Show Must Go On, which she is releasing as an audiobook at the start of 2022.

Hutcherson had been a professional dancer for most of her life, working as backup dancers for celebrities like Jennifer Lopez and Madonna and she was teaching dance at Broadway Dance Center as well. At 26-years-old, she was diagnosed with an aggressive form of breast cancer. And through it all, poetry became an outlet.

“I went through the ringer,” she said. “I had a 15-hour surgery; I went through chemo; I froze my eggs; I lost my hair. I did the whole bit, and I was cancer free for four years, which was a huge blessing. Then again, at 30, I was diagnosed a second time, and that time it had metastasized to my bones, which was a huge shock. Around that time, during that four-year window, I had been working on a poetry book, as an outlet since I wasn’t able to dance so much.”

It was three days after The Show Must Go On was published that Hutcherson received her second diagnosis. She was able to beat cancer the second time, but in December 2020, the cancer had spread again. And now she is working to convert her poems, which chronicle her experience with cancer, life and love, including a domestic violence relationship, to an audiobook. Hutcherson is looking to have the audiobook be a more immersive experience for readers.

“What makes my audiobook a little different is that I wanted to take the listener on a journey with me,” Hutcherson said “So if I have a poem called ‘E.R.,’ it’s not just me reading the poem, you can hear the sounds in the background of the beeping machines, the nurses talking, patients milling around, so I’m really bringing the listener into the room with me, and every poem is like that. It’s really a journey and an experience, and that was so important to me because I wanted people to feel what I’m feeling. Or there’s a poem called ‘River’ – a lot of days when I

get out of the hospital, one of my favorite things to do is just go by the river and have some peace, you’ll hear the river, so it’s been a beautiful process, and there’s 200 poems. It’s been fun.”

To her, these poems are an outlet, but they’re also a way to help connect people with similar experiences.

“I’m 32 years old, so just being a young person, one of the things that’s always been hardest for me is

I’m always the youngest one at the cancer center and one thing that’s so important to me for other young survivors is I want them to feel like they’re not alone,” Hutcherson said. “Sometimes for me, it’s felt like that in my journey and I’m really passionate about sharing the message that other young survivors are not alone either.”

While her focus had been primarily dance, she has been writing poetry since the age of 13. She had been shy about sharing her writing, but on the day she had to shave her head, she decided she wanted to share a poem to Facebook called ‘I Am Not My Hair.’ Hutcherson said there was a woman in the same hospital who had seen it – the location had been shared in addition to the poem – and that was a moment that changed Hutcherson forever, she said, and a reason she decided to share her poetry. “The woman was standing in the doorway with tears in her eyes, and she just wanted to meet me and give me a hug and that was a day that changed my life forever,” Hutcherson said. “I remember my mom, me and this woman, and we were all crying, and I said to my mom, ‘These poems are not for me, they’re for them,’ and it pierced me because I realized I had to get over my ego and shyness of what if people do or don’t like them. I heard this thing before that was like it’s not about perfection, it’s about connection and I think that was a turning point for me because it

was understanding other people needed to connect and you’re not the only one going through it – we’re all in this together and it sucks but we’re doing it together.”

Publishing the collection of poems was a very vulnerable experience for Hutcherson. She spent three years writing it, and each poem was very personal.

“My poems weren’t just about cancer, it was about my family, it was about friendships, it was about my faith, it was about a romantic relationship I got into while I was going through cancer that started out really beautiful and wound up being a sadly domestic violence relationship. And that was painful to write about; I never thought I’d go through with it and publish it,” Hutcherson said. “I let all my scars show in that book, and it was just when I finally released it in the world, it just felt like I

could breathe, and I wasn’t holding anything back. I felt like in one word, there was healing in that book – for myself and for others, because I know for a fact that there’s other people going through it. It’s interesting too, I released it in October 2019, so that’s Breast Cancer Awareness Month, but also what a lot of other people don’t realize is it’s also Domestic Violence Awareness Month. One in eight women in this country have breast cancer, and one in three women have been in a domestic violence relationship, which is scary and awful. So, when you look at those statistics, it’s like I know that book belongs in the hands of so many women and men because I think women and men must do better, and that starts with not only communication but comprehension. There needs to be materials out there so we can understand each other better.”

To also inspire unity, in 2020, Hutcherson hosted LivStrong, a podcast she published every Monday where she interviewed artists and influential people – all who were resilient, whether it was cancer or domestic violence or people who moved to the United States to follow a dream or members of the Black Lives Matter movement. Her goal was to share how people were “living strong through really tough circumstances,” she said.

In addition to the podcast and writing, Hutcherson also has continued teaching dance five hours a week, as well as spending time working with her church and spending four days a week in the hospital for treatments. She is also doing book signings at locations like PEAK Performing Arts Center. It has been an adjustment, she said, after spending so long as a professional dancer, training and teaching and going to auditions. But for her, she describes it as an “unlearning,” as she works to remove expectations and pressures and learn how to be kind to herself as she goes through these treatments.

“It’s just been an unlearning for me, to just understand I’m not what I do; I’m not my hair; I’m not my breasts; I’m not my job title; I am a spirit inside of my body and I’m doing the best that I can and just being able to rest and sit with that and I am love at the end of the day,” she said. “I want to love; I want to be loved; and I want to give love and as long as I’m doing that in as many mediums as I can – whether it’s through my poetry or my dancing – that’s enough for me. I had to learn how to be kind to myself. I want to give all this kindness to the world but it’s like I’ve had to learn how to be kind to myself and not so hard on myself. It’s a daily practice.”

In that same respect, she wants to help remind other people going through treatments to rest more and to set healthy boundaries to take care of yourself. And to everyone, she hopes to spread positivity.

“I have a very close relationship with God and Jesus. I wouldn’t say I’m a religious person, I always say I have a relationship with God and it’s very personal to me. It gives me hope; it gives me faith; it gives me strength on the days where I feel like I literally can’t keep going. And my mom inspires me. She is my rock; she’s my everything. I don’t think she’s missed a beat over these last six years. She has just been my ride-or-die person,” Hutcherson said.

“Children inspire me too. They bring me so much joy. I teach dancing. I still teach now, not as much as I was. I used to teach about 20 hours a week and now I teach about 5 hours a week, so there’s been a big shift in the amount of teaching I do. I teach a lot of children though, and they’re so pure and they have so much love and no filter and I remember the day I shaved my head the second time and I came in and they wanted to kiss my head. There’s just this purity, love and joy from kids that inspires me to want to be more like them.”

Hutcherson is currently going through treatments now, and she’s feeling grateful that treatments are going well. In addition to the audiobook, she is also working on her second collection of poetry, which is halfway completed. She is growing and is constantly looking to not only improve herself but also to help other people find peace and positivity. “I think the biggest message I’d want to spread is it’s just so utterly important to not only be happy but to be whole,” she said “I think so many times people have this finite idea, especially in our culture, that they want to be happy –it’s this microwave generation of I want it now. I want it fast, Netflix, Uber, Tinder, anything fast, anything happy for this momentary relief versus being whole. You really must get to a place where you understand how to be whole, whatever that means for you, whether that be getting a relationship with God, going to therapy or slowing down long enough to heal broken relationships in your family or have a support system from your friends or just reaching a place where you’re whole on your own before being whole with somebody else. When you come to the table and you’re broken and you get with another broken person, it just leads to disaster. And I can speak to this because I’m in the middle of this horrific, chronic disease right now, but I still have peace; I still have joy; I still can find peace during it all because I have my faith and family, and I’m in therapy and I’m open to all these things like I don’t have a perfect life. I can find my moments of peace and my inner peace and I’m not just looking for someone else because I’m a hot mess, which is how I was a few years ago. You have to be okay on your own first before someone can make you okay.”

More information about Olivia Summer Hutcherson can be found on her website at www.olivialivstrong.com, and her book The Show Must Go On is available on Amazon.com.

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