Hi Shouva, Im a BC survivor too and I maintain biking saved my life. I had surgery, followed by a nasty experience with chemo/radiotherapy in 2002. It's only since I started riding a bike that I started to feel remotely like myself.

I ride a road bike and have slowly worked my way into the drops so that it's now my preferred position for riding. I have to say I started by accident and I started on one of my daughter's old 10 speed. I rode to work every day and the ride to work would take me 35-40 minutes but for the first few months it could take me anything up to an hour and a half to get home. I was pretty nervous to begin with cos the traffic here is pretty unforgiving and once I fell off because I was going too slow.

Anyway, I have graduated from a "girls" bike to a compact road bike. I have to confess that I miss the comfort of the old steel bike and I think I will convert it to a fixed gear bike for commuting.

I would suggest that you dont invest too much in a bike until you have got a few miles under your belt and feel confident. It does come back . When I started I was quite self conscious but now I wear lycra and couldnt care less what ppl think.

Best wishes

Hilary