Every three months I either get imaging and see my surgeon or have labs and meet with my oncologist. That means that every three months, I have to revisit the question, if shit goes south this time, am I good with this version of myself?
Immediately following treatment, I was riding high in the glow of the eyebrowless warrior. My priorities felt right. My outlook was positive. I felt loved. And then, life. I had all of these big plans after I finished treatment– things I’d do to take advantage of not being dead. Most ended up not turning out as expected, or getting postponed, or just fading into oblivion as big plans often do.
I read an IG post by a woman who was asked when she started to feel like herself again after cancer treatment and her answer was – I didn’t, and I don’t expect that I will ever again. And it’s true. There is a clear cut before and after. I am me, but I am no longer me. My body doesn’t look the same. My hair doesn’t look the same. The lens through which I process the world is most decidedly not the same.
In some ways, the recognition of my mortality has been helpful. I try to spend as much time as possible with the people who mean the most to me. I frequently stop to silently appreciate how much I love them, or how much they make me laugh, or how grateful I am that they are in my life.
At the same time, it’s made me more pragmatic, probably to a fault. Sometimes I hear myself talk and hear a hardened version of who I used to be. I have little patience for other people’s bullshit. I don’t like to waste my time on what-ifs. I know how short life is, and at the end of mine, I want to look back and just feel like I did it right. However, because I do not live in a vacuum, not-me exists in the same life with the same pre-treatment challenges, which is disorienting and frustrating at best. It’s like walking around with David Byrne singing in my ear all of the time. How did I get here?
I hold on to the smallest moments now: snuggling on the couch reading books with my kids; laughing so hard with my husband and our friends that I cry; video chatting with my one-year-old niece; watching our old dog lumber through our quiet backyard in the winter. I stop thinking about what everything means and I’m just there. I’m there. Everything else is too big for right now. In those small moments, though, I am all me.
katie miller dunn 