It’s my cancerversary.
Today, November 7th, is officially the one year mark of my official cancer diagnosis, and a hell of a lot has happened! I keep rewriting this post, because I’m not really sure what kind of a vibe I’m giving off, but I just took a breathe and reminded myself to type as if I’m having a conversation with someone… so let’s see where it goes…
I’ll start with the fact that today I’m grateful – because look at me now! I’m through the thick of it, I’m healthy, I’m recovering and I’m alive. So if that doesn’t represent the meaning of being grateful then I don’t know what does. I look at my kids and I’m grateful they have no freaking idea how serious of a situation it was, and how much worse it could have been.
I’ve been reliving everything, which is… interesting. It is hard to describe how I feel, but there are definitely some feelings about it all. I can’t help but think about everything I’m doing these days in the context of ‘then I got cancer’ or ‘because I had cancer’. It’s not negative, or anything like that, it just is, and I can’t help it. So I’m trying to allow myself to feel all the feels, without judging it, or myself.
Also, I’m a little annoyed. Is it ok to admit that? This diagnosis was a major disruption in my life, to say the least. It has changed my career, it has changed my relationships with people and it has changed my outlook on life. This was a life changing experience, for me and for a ton of people in my life.
I am a bit scared that it isn’t over. I know that it technically ISN’T over because I’m still in a form of treatment, and I still have a surgery ahead of me. But I also know that it technically IS over because there is no evidence of cancer in my body, and I’m finished with all the hard stuff. But what if they missed something? What if it comes back? I hate to think of these questions out loud, but they’re there. I don’t let it paralyze me or anything, but it’s a tiny little voice that speaks up almost every day, if not a couple times a day. I’m sure it’ll fade with more time, and trust me I look forward to that!
(Me, last year. Nov 7th diagnosis and Nov 28 surgery)
All cancer patients seem to have a different ‘cancerversary’. In my conversations with the many people in my situation, it seems to be most common that it’s the day they found out they were cancer free. And this will obviously have a different definition for everyone… because we have all had different experiences all together. Some have a scan months after treatment ends, some consider it to be the their last day of treatment, and for some it’s a date they’ve chosen because of something significant in their experience. BUT MINE feels like today, because it was the day everything changed, for the rest of my life, because of cancer.
So it was on this day last year that I was diagnosed, a plan was set in place, and I had approximately 3 weeks to prepare myself, my family, friends, colleagues, clients and basically all aspects of my whole life for what was to come. Then it came, and then it went.
So, happy cancerversary to me.