The "C" Word....One Year Later......

It’s hard to believe it’s been 1 year since my Mom’s cancer diagnosis. It seems like yesterday, yet seems like a lifetime ago. Sometimes it’s hard to wrap your brain around the concept of time when you are so busy with life, so many things you take for granted, so much time wasted on stupid, menial things and before you know it, it’s a year later.  So much has happened in this past year, but the day of the diagnosis sticks in your head like a bad song you can’t shake off and remains there, poking it’s head out every now and then to remind you it’s there, to remind you that NOTHING is promised in this life. The funny thing is… LIFE DOES GO ON, without promises and regardless of anything….life goes on.

When something tragic happens, everyone slows down for a bit and it feels like the world has stopped, but it hasn’t, life continues on around it. The day of the Sandy Hook shootings and for weeks after, it felt like the world stopped, I couldn’t stop thinking about it. I cried, I was angry, I was glued to the television, I empathized with every one of those parents, I grieved with those parents. I pictured myself being one of those parents, what would I be thinking at that moment? Would I sit in my child’s room and cling to anything that smelled like them and sob and sob and sob? Would I be suicidal? Would I just not care about anything or anyone anymore and just want to die , myself? Did they have to see their children in the morgue? How could they let them go? Ugh, I tortured myself to tears daily. The day of the Boston Marathon bombings, I did the same. I watched them take down the remaining suspect and I cheered that they caught him. I wanted them to destroy him for what he did to those innocent people. But life didn’t stand still for any of the surviving victims/families of those tragedies.  Those Sandy Hook parents still had to take care of their other children, eat, sleep, go back to work. The injured Boston Marathon victims still have a long road ahead, to heal, to learn to live life in a totally different way, mentally and physically. And the families of those killed have to suffer a loss like no other.  In the weeks and months after a tragedy like this happens, the world eventually stops talking about it, but the victims don’t stop thinking about it, they never will. It will keep poking itself in their thoughts, reminding them that nothing is promised in this life.  

I am what is called an “absorber”, always have been, which I have come to learn is a bad thing. I absorb the problems of others as if they were my own and it affects me very deeply. I guess in some ways it’s a good thing, because I do believe it has taught me compassion and empathy which are two very important qualities to have as a nurse. However, it deeply affects my emotions and at times leaves me paralyzed, finding it very difficult to continue on with daily activities. My grandmother (who I got my “worrying” genes from) once told me when I was terribly saddened by something that happened to someone else, “Steffi, it’s not your cross to bear, you will have your own crosses, save your energy for your own crosses”. Her words are right, but it’s a hard trait to shake.

My Mom’s cancer has been one of my crosses to bear. Not only because I love her and I don’t want to lose her, but because I feel so badly for her to have to go through all she has with this diagnosis. Cancer is mean. It robs your looks, your health, your emotions and your general enjoyment of life, if you survive it. Even if you beat it, it always lingers in the corner of your thoughts taunting you that it could come back and that it will always be a part of your life. I HATE CANCER! I hate it like I hate the shooter at Sandy hook, like I hate the Boston Marathon bombers, like I hate anyone or anything that robs someone of something and gives them no choice but to think about it every single day of their lives. I HATE IT!!

I could dwell on my hated of cancer forever, but it would eat me alive and I refuse to let it do that. I will try and look at things through my Mom’s eyes, who even  after multiple surgeries, infections, medications (some requiring bone scans and blood work to even be able to take) and more “procedures” than I can even remember, still always sees the glass half full, not half empty like me. I am trying to focus on the positive things that have come out of this year. Like the amazing friends and family we have that came out of the woodwork to support my Mom in this journey to fight this bastard. We walked in the Making Strides Against Breast Cancer walk last October as Team Jody’s Jugs with the most wonderful group of family and friends anyone could ever ask for supporting us. We raised $4,667.68, which was 16^th place out of 347 teams. It’s actually an incredible amount considering the only teams that raised more than us were large organizations. So, in light of the amazing generosity and support I have seen from the wonderful people in my life, I will try and focus not on my hatred of cancer but on continuing to support my Mom in her FIGHT AGAINST cancer.  I will be proud of both of us because this 1 year anniversary also marks the 1 year anniversary of us quitting smoking (with the exception of a drunken slip up here and there with my favorite Hooka’s). Anyone who knows me knows THAT is an accomplishment of a lifetime for me. And I will also try to stop being an “absorber”, unless it’s to absorb some of my Mom’s positive outlook on life. I will try and look at all of this in a positive manner, be grateful for the closer friendships I have formed from it and I will try and learn something from it because life will continue to go on, without promises and regardless of anything. As my Mom said to my gasping reaction to her when she was looking at revealing bathing suits to show off her new Boobies, “ I am using this experience as a chance to reinvent myself”.  Go Mama Go!!