Do you ever sit back and look at your situation and just be like,” this can’t be actually happening right now?” Like you’ve stepped off of the elevator into the twilight zone or that crazy island on Lost.
There’s no way I’ve been battling cancer for the last year.
There’s no way I have gone through months of chemotherapy.
There’s no way I was bald and moon faced from the meds.
There’s no way I had a completely life altering surgery to amputate parts of my body to have them replaced by hard plastic foreign objects.
There’s no way I’m in the middle of all of these treatments and surgeries.
And while all that is, indeed, happening life just…goes on. The world never stopped turning. The days keep coming and they never stop coming, amiright?
It’s like for brief moments I forget that all of that has taken place and then all of a sudden BAM! I’m reminded that I need to chill and I am, in fact, a cancer patient.
Don’t just assume that because the “hard” part of active treatment is over that the cancer journey is over because it isn’t. The hard part is just beginning. Imposter syndrome is real. Survivors guilt is real. Life will never be the same again and you have to choose every day to be intentional with how you approach it or it will overtake you.
No one talks about how survivorship is harder than active treatment. Maybe it’s time someone does?
