The hardest part?

"The hardest part about having cancer is when it's over."

Someone told me this when I was living at my dad's in 2004, newly into remission and recovering from my transplant.  I was 22 at the time and thought her words (spoken from experience) were CRAZY.  What on earth is she talking about?!  Does she not know what I just endured in the hospital??  I literally felt my body dieing until it reached it's weakest moment and BOOM, I was into the pain and misery of my transplant.  I was BEYOND happy to be walking and eating normal food again, let alone living outside of the hospital.  My 15 month battle was finally coming to an end - the BEST part, not hardest.  This woman might be nuts...  But then again, she is a close friend of my father's so even though I didn't trust her words of expertise, I decided to keep them in the back of my mind.  Good thing I did - she was right.

I started off 2005 with radiation therapy and remission.  I was so young and I had the entire world of opportunities in front of me.  I was also falling in love with someone; someone who was also going through the exact same phase in life.  He was the same age with a similar story... and he had entered remission only a few months before me.  We experienced treatment, doc appointments, and hospital stays together.  What was a strong bond slowly became a 6 year relationship.  The love did not survive, but we both did.  And I know we were so successful 7 years ago entering remission because we had each other.  So those words of wisdom were absolute trash to me.  Yes, it was difficult reentering the world again, but it was exhilarating.  I was once again free.

In my last post, Week One of Remission I touch on having to deal with ordinary life stress as if it was never a stress in the last 12 months.  I just reread that and realized wow, I might have been lucky to experience remission last time as a happy-go-lucky-22-year-old, but with 30 on the horizon, entering remission is very different.  I'm in a much different place in life.  Even though I was still dealing with the responsibilities of life during the past year, I really just didn't care.  The only thing I cared about was being happy while fighting a terminal illness... an illness that has not only became the determinate in so many of my day-to-day decisions, but life decisions as well.  Why should I care about putting enough in my savings every month if I might never reach a future month to use it?  Well, now that it's confirmed that I'm going to be staying here for awhile (and to be clear, this is not a complaint), it's slightly stressful. 

SO, think I'm crazy?  WTH is this girl complaining about?!  She just beat cancer!  Again!  It's time to rejoice, NOT dwell on finances and life goals!  Haha, well the good news is that I like to think that I have a pretty quick rebound with things like this.  So have no worries, usually once I get it out of my system and have the opportunity to complain to the world I'm pretty much over it.  So since last week, I am feeling a lot better about life.  What also helps is hearing about it from others, too.  A friend of mine who I met through Amy when we were in high school has also beaten the odds.  She wrote to me the other night confessing her dark days after cancer.  Why do we all feel so lost when it's all said and done?  Cancer, you sure do have a way of controlling not only our bodies, but our minds as well.  Well it's too bad you chose me, because I don't let down very easily.  Ask Kristin Jane, I put up a good fight if there is something I want.  I know how to always get my way :)