Forever changed, Never the Same, Strange New Me
Can you tell just by looking at someone that they have cancer? Can you tell just by looking at them when it's gone? No, you can't. So when someone has went through chemo and they're starting to act more like they did before cancer, how can you tell, just by looking at them, how they're doing? The answer to that is that you can't.
I may look good. I may appear healthy and happy. I may try my hardest to be the person I used to be but the truth is I'm not. Cancer has forever changed me. Chemo has forever changed me. While your impatience with me to be "normal" may be huge, imagine my impatience at myself.
I don't see anything in the same light I saw it prior to cancer and I never will. My brain doesn't always work the way I want it to. I'm not sure if it's a side effect of chemo (chemo brain) or the stress of the cancer. Sometimes my choices may seem strange to you, but you don't have the threat of cancer lurking like another malignancy in your mind. Sometimes my choices seem strange to me too. Then I am made to think about my predicament. Maybe an exorcism would free me, who knows.
I don't know who I am anymore so it's no surprise you don't understand me. I try to drink in each day like it may be my last because, well, it might be. My mind knows the cancer is gone, or was the last time they checked, but when and where is it going to pop up again? True it may be gone permanently but no one knows. And these constant rechecks are part of the problem. How do I begin a life after cancer when I'm periodically being probed, in every sense of the word, in search of cancer?
Cancer is never out of my mind. It is a constant companion and it appears that will probably be the case until the day I die. Even if I'm smacked by a truck my last thought will probably be, "And they thought the cancer would get me."
I know I probably annoy you with all my talk of cancer but I don't know how to pluck the word from my conversations entirely. The word tumbles in my brain more often each day than "sex" does in a horny teenage boy. With that much action it's impossible for it to not leak out occasionally. I try to edit it and I try not give it any credit for my weirdnesses but it's there and surely it has some effect. Now you know how much of me cancer has really consumed.
I think I can understand how you feel. While I am lucky enough never to
have suffered from cancer it is my biggest fear and I can be very
unrational. If I get a cough it's cancer, pull a muscle that takes time to
heal, it's cancer etc etc. For you it must be magnified as you are been
through it and continue to get tested. For me I think it is a fear of
laving my family.
I guess that's the hardest part for me. I never even thought I would get
cancer. Of course the fear crossed my mind but I quickly dismissed it as
being an unreal fear.
Not only is it on my mind constantly, it is the context in which I perceive
the world (read: cancer and ensuing medical problems). I feel like I have
it scribbled across my face, and that I am wearing a t-shirt that says "I
had cancer, it went away but it left its mark by stealing my ovaries, my
ability to control my weight, my fertility and my capacity to be happy
without antidepressants." And I feel that everyone I speak to knows, or can
smell it in my perfume, or see it in my face, or hear it in the silence
that follows each sentence I utter. And if they don't know, then I feel
that I am wearing a Burka when I meet them, and that they only see my eyes
so will not be able to distinguish me from strangers until I rip off the
Burka and allow my medical madness to tumble from my mouth. Ok, this is an
indulgent post. This is your blog, not mine. I'll leave my barking for my
own blog.