Well, after a loooonnnggg few months, a little break and an AMAZING holiday, it's finally October (actually mid October - blame the amazing holiday for my absence). October is the month I have been waiting for all year. The month when chemo (for now anyway) would be over. Weirdly, it's been quite anti-climatic.
I'm wondering is it that I haven't been scanned yet to see what's what (scan Nov 1st, results on the 5th, holiday #2 on the 6th!). Maybe until I hear that word 'remission', and for real this time, not as the result of someone's cock up, I can't begin to move on. Maybe I simply won't move on even if I do hear that R word and instead will live in a kind of limbo, waiting for my relapse as if it's a certainty. Maybe I won't be hearing the R word at all and will be spending my holiday thinking about the bone marrow transplant that awaits me on my return. Or, maybe it will simply never sink in that chemo is over and then it will just become normal soon to be forgotten. 'Remember that time you had cancer?'
Just before I left on holiday, someone close to me asked what the hardest part of the whole experience so far had been. I told her that I expect the hardest part to be yet to come - the battle in my mind between wanting SO MUCH to put this behind me and not being able to forget that it's like a vicious guard dog, fenced in but snarling and ready to attack given the tiniest opportunity. Wondering if every twinge, every time I feel tired, every cramp in my neck or chest is a sign that it's back. That the dog has gotten through that gate and is chewing it's way through my body once again. To take that battle a step further you then need to throw in the irrational guilt - the feeling that just by thinking about relapse, by not being optimistic, by worrying about that dog getting loose that you are losing. You are moaning. If you mention the possibility to people naturally their first reaction is 'No, that won't happen, think positively'. Hmmmm easy for you to say, let's see how positive you would feel if you could no longer trust your own body after it has tried to kill you!
Weirdly, it hasn't been affecting me as much as I thought. The fact that I am no longer 'actively' fighting pacman and his buddies is not as scary as I had anticipated. It made me realise that in fact the hardest part was feeling relatively well and getting out of bed, going to hospital and allowing people to hook you up to the bags of poison, knowing all too well how you would be feeling by the end of the day. Nobody who has not been through it could imagine the willpower it takes to ignore the voice in your head yelling 'STOP WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING DON'T GO IN THERE'!!! 12 times. That kind of endurance and motivation deserves that not only do you come away with your life and your health, but also a medal. A BIG one. And probably some sort of substantial cash prize.
Who knows though, I'm still a baby in the cancer world, I don't even know do I still have it or not. The hardest part may very well be yet to come. I however am spending each day living under the assumption that the worst is well and truly over. What else can you do? If you spend the rest of your time living in fear of that dog getting loose and attacking you again then he might as well have killed you the first time.
I'm wondering is it that I haven't been scanned yet to see what's what (scan Nov 1st, results on the 5th, holiday #2 on the 6th!). Maybe until I hear that word 'remission', and for real this time, not as the result of someone's cock up, I can't begin to move on. Maybe I simply won't move on even if I do hear that R word and instead will live in a kind of limbo, waiting for my relapse as if it's a certainty. Maybe I won't be hearing the R word at all and will be spending my holiday thinking about the bone marrow transplant that awaits me on my return. Or, maybe it will simply never sink in that chemo is over and then it will just become normal soon to be forgotten. 'Remember that time you had cancer?'
Just before I left on holiday, someone close to me asked what the hardest part of the whole experience so far had been. I told her that I expect the hardest part to be yet to come - the battle in my mind between wanting SO MUCH to put this behind me and not being able to forget that it's like a vicious guard dog, fenced in but snarling and ready to attack given the tiniest opportunity. Wondering if every twinge, every time I feel tired, every cramp in my neck or chest is a sign that it's back. That the dog has gotten through that gate and is chewing it's way through my body once again. To take that battle a step further you then need to throw in the irrational guilt - the feeling that just by thinking about relapse, by not being optimistic, by worrying about that dog getting loose that you are losing. You are moaning. If you mention the possibility to people naturally their first reaction is 'No, that won't happen, think positively'. Hmmmm easy for you to say, let's see how positive you would feel if you could no longer trust your own body after it has tried to kill you!
Weirdly, it hasn't been affecting me as much as I thought. The fact that I am no longer 'actively' fighting pacman and his buddies is not as scary as I had anticipated. It made me realise that in fact the hardest part was feeling relatively well and getting out of bed, going to hospital and allowing people to hook you up to the bags of poison, knowing all too well how you would be feeling by the end of the day. Nobody who has not been through it could imagine the willpower it takes to ignore the voice in your head yelling 'STOP WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING DON'T GO IN THERE'!!! 12 times. That kind of endurance and motivation deserves that not only do you come away with your life and your health, but also a medal. A BIG one. And probably some sort of substantial cash prize.
Who knows though, I'm still a baby in the cancer world, I don't even know do I still have it or not. The hardest part may very well be yet to come. I however am spending each day living under the assumption that the worst is well and truly over. What else can you do? If you spend the rest of your time living in fear of that dog getting loose and attacking you again then he might as well have killed you the first time.
Best of luck for tomorrow my dear. CX
ReplyDeleteYour last sentence is the best one I've read in a long long time. You are a writer, please publish this blog as a book, it's fantastic. x
ReplyDelete