Editor's note: In the Human Factor, we profile survivors who have overcome the odds. Confronting a life obstacle – injury, illness or other hardship – they tapped their inner strength and found resilience they didn't know they possessed. This week Roxanne Black talks about the social network she started for people dealing with a serious illness.

Those of us who face illness remember the before and after moments: The day the phone rang, or the doctor walked into your hospital room, and it was clear that life as you had known it was about to change. You discover that you have cancer or multiple sclerosis, or that your loved one has been diagnosed with a chronic disease.

You hang up the phone or walk out of the hospital feeling as if your world has been transformed.  It’s not simply fear that makes you so disoriented – it’s because you are in the midst of experiencing a true glimpse of the great preciousness and precariousness of life.

On a daily basis, we tend to be conditioned to live within a limited perception of our consciousness and power. Yet illness manages to help us find ourselves, to free ourselves. It is in the face of suffering that so many of us are thrown into the depths of ourselves and come up bearing treasures of strength, insight and courage we never knew were there.
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