Don't fear slowly moving forward. Fear standing still.
Today marks 4 months since I underwent a bilateral mastectomy. I'm so thankful to be back running strong; it's almost hard to believe that a few short months ago I couldn't even lift my arms over my head or make it through the afternoon without a 2-hr nap. I read an article last week by a medical oncologist who wrote that cancer is a chronic illness: once you are diagnosed, there is always a possibility of recurrence and the best you can hope for is to be NED, "no evidence of disease". When I was out running that day, I was reflecting on this stark statement as well as the language of breast cancer: words like "warrior", "battle", and "survivor" are so commonplace in the lexicon that people don't seem to think twice about using them. As I ran I wondered, Am I ill? A warrior? A survivor? NED? I really don't relate to any of these terms, nor do I want any of them to be used to describe me or my experience.
For me, this past 9 months since my diagnosis has felt like navigating a strange and winding journey with a map but no compass. At times, I have ached with the frustration of not being in control of where the ride was taking me (I have heard it referred to as the "cancer train", and this I can understand). In other moments, I have felt grateful for being given the power to make informed decisions about my treatment, even though it has been a series of nearly impossible choices that I never imagined having to make. There have even been many days and weeks when I don't think about it at all. Even though I am taking medication daily as an "insurance policy" against recurrence elsewhere in my body, I do not feel like I am fighting something - instead, I choose to put my energy into being accepting and to continue, one step at a time, on this journey. And in the meantime I am living my life, no differently than I was 9 months ago, except maybe with more gratitude. Maybe with more perspective. And maybe with a renewed motivation to just keep going.
On the day I was thinking about "no evidence of disease", I was about 5k into my run when I decided that I would refuse to let that reality make me live in fear of some distant possibility - after all, life is full of those, so why let them paralyze us? Right at that moment, I looked up at the Burrard Bridge as I passed underneath it and instantly flashed back to the first time I ever bonked on a run. I was training for my first marathon and nearing the end of a 20-miler when I was faced with climbing the stairs onto that bridge - the apparent impossibility of the task was so overwhelming that I almost sat down and cried. But of course, I didn't do that: I willed myself upward, one exhausting step at a time, and made it through the remaining 3k of the run.
For me, this past 9 months since my diagnosis has felt like navigating a strange and winding journey with a map but no compass. At times, I have ached with the frustration of not being in control of where the ride was taking me (I have heard it referred to as the "cancer train", and this I can understand). In other moments, I have felt grateful for being given the power to make informed decisions about my treatment, even though it has been a series of nearly impossible choices that I never imagined having to make. There have even been many days and weeks when I don't think about it at all. Even though I am taking medication daily as an "insurance policy" against recurrence elsewhere in my body, I do not feel like I am fighting something - instead, I choose to put my energy into being accepting and to continue, one step at a time, on this journey. And in the meantime I am living my life, no differently than I was 9 months ago, except maybe with more gratitude. Maybe with more perspective. And maybe with a renewed motivation to just keep going.
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| "Don't fear slowly moving forward. Fear standing still". - Unknown |
There have been so many "impossible" tasks since that happened some 15 years ago, but all I've needed to face them I learned on that very day: to cross the bridge, you just need to find a way to climb the stairs. For me, it's not about fighting battles or a war - it is simply about continuing to move forward.
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