Saturday, August 25, 2007
Cancer
I really have been thinking about my recent health issue as ... a hysterectomy. Maybe because the bleeding problems I have had for years ... this was always one of the options.
So in my head I have been thinking that it was just the hysto, not that ... I actually had/have cancer.
Denial thy name is Susan.
But if they think they got it all, I am just on a watchful couple of years, then it is like it is gone. Not like others who to do radiation or chemo. Not me. So this shouldn't really bother me. Am I really a cancer survivor? oh gawd. For all the definitions I have for myself, this truly is not something I can wrap my head around.
Then today I went to a church retreat. My first real outing with people. It was great. I love my church and the people in it. They are crazy and opinionated and infuriating and wonderful.
I talked to a woman I don't know that well but really, really like. She was a great support when my mother first started her crisis in March. Her mother has alzheimers. She heard through the grapevine what I was going through and reached out. Wow. That is what a community is about.
I was pretty quiet about what was going on with me. I guess I was embarrassed. I am the caretaker, not the person who gets care. (Because of crises with both kids when they were born, I was never allowed to just it back and heal and enjoy and now with this my parents needs were superceeding mine to the point that I wasn't even 24 hours post surgery when my father was telling me all kinds of shit on the phone about his and my mother's needs when I was on morphine! wah, wah. poor susan. shut up.)
But today I got lots of love and support. And it is stupid because I used to be really critical of the caring committee and then I didn't even allow them to let people know about my surgery. I think I really don't know how to be cared FOR.
Oh, right. So this friend. Hears me out and lets me know she is a breast cancer survivor and says what no one else has said about how I have to have lots of feelings about all this even if the news is good. Wow. What a gift. What a blessing. Yep. I have. And I have pretty much dealt with it alone. But I guess I am not.
I am truly blessed to bring great people into my life.
Wisdom. I think the best part of that is searching out other people who already have it.
And so it goes.
Susan
So in my head I have been thinking that it was just the hysto, not that ... I actually had/have cancer.
Denial thy name is Susan.
But if they think they got it all, I am just on a watchful couple of years, then it is like it is gone. Not like others who to do radiation or chemo. Not me. So this shouldn't really bother me. Am I really a cancer survivor? oh gawd. For all the definitions I have for myself, this truly is not something I can wrap my head around.
Then today I went to a church retreat. My first real outing with people. It was great. I love my church and the people in it. They are crazy and opinionated and infuriating and wonderful.
I talked to a woman I don't know that well but really, really like. She was a great support when my mother first started her crisis in March. Her mother has alzheimers. She heard through the grapevine what I was going through and reached out. Wow. That is what a community is about.
I was pretty quiet about what was going on with me. I guess I was embarrassed. I am the caretaker, not the person who gets care. (Because of crises with both kids when they were born, I was never allowed to just it back and heal and enjoy and now with this my parents needs were superceeding mine to the point that I wasn't even 24 hours post surgery when my father was telling me all kinds of shit on the phone about his and my mother's needs when I was on morphine! wah, wah. poor susan. shut up.)
But today I got lots of love and support. And it is stupid because I used to be really critical of the caring committee and then I didn't even allow them to let people know about my surgery. I think I really don't know how to be cared FOR.
Oh, right. So this friend. Hears me out and lets me know she is a breast cancer survivor and says what no one else has said about how I have to have lots of feelings about all this even if the news is good. Wow. What a gift. What a blessing. Yep. I have. And I have pretty much dealt with it alone. But I guess I am not.
I am truly blessed to bring great people into my life.
Wisdom. I think the best part of that is searching out other people who already have it.
And so it goes.
Susan
