The changing of the seasons seems to be getting my attention a lot more than it ever did before. When we were driving to the hospital every day I kept saying how I wanted to see the trees start to bud and grow leaves. I wanted to see the snow melt away, and flowers start to sprout. I wanted to listen to the crickets chirping outside my window at night.
When the leaves started to fall, hearing them crunch under my feet while I walked, made me gleeful. I love the smell of smoke coming from the chimineys in the old brick houses on my street. The stars have almost come all the way around to where they were when this chapter started.
Everything is something. I think being out of treatment now, anniversaries are starting to approach. I've almost made it through one more year of seasons.
There is no right or wrong, but it seems like i'm struggling with life after cancer. While I am thankful of every second I have, is it right to be proud of what you accomplished? Is it right to share it with people, or should I pretend it never happened?
On more than one occasion recently I have been told that I use my cancer to define myself. It angered me to hear that, because when you go through what I did, how do you not accept the fact that it has forever changed me? I am not defined by it, but I have been changed by it, and it will always be a part of my life. I will always be a cancer survivor.
Nobody I know quite knows what I went through. I felt myself dying. The more time that passes, and the more time I have to reflect, I realise that I felt my brain shutting my body down. I felt myself slip into a coma, I felt my body giving up on me. It's not like nobody has ever almost died before, but I don't think it's fair not to allow that person to reflect and heal and be after it happens.
And at the same time, is it right to celebrate these anniversaries? I have a particular date in mind, that has nothing to do with remission, but rather the discovery. I just don't know how to let it go. I don't know how you go through what I went through and leave it right there where it happened.
I do know that i'm grateful for every thing in my world because of it. I know that losing friends over it was tough. Losing hair proved to be tougher. (Having it grow back has been horrible!) Losing my job, my independence, etc...
I have to start from scratch like a kid, and I want to have that anniversary so I can always remember why I am where I am and who I am, etc.
Anyway, I just needed to sort of talk to myself a bit about that. Sorry if it was boring.
Matthew, you have no idea how much you made my day today. I miss you. :)