In just a week and a half, I will have what should be my final cancer-related surgery, the swap out of my adjustable saline implants for the more anatomically shaped, state-of-the-art "gummi bear" silicone implants. This will be the last surgery until said implants need to be replaced, which will hopefully not be for many years.
Understandably, everyone has said, "Boy, you must really be looking forward to this all being over!" And yes, yes, of course I am, but...
Even saying goodbye to something bad brings with it a kind of grief. When I was preparing to spend a year in Slovakia as a Young Adult in Global Mission, we learned about the culture shock we would experience, but we also learned about reverse culture shock, the experience you have when you return home to what should be familiar but suddenly it no longer feels quite right. Reverse culture shock can be more difficult and trying than culture shock, because when you go you expect it to be different, but when you return, you expect it to be the same as it was, and it isn't. Others have changed, and even more, you have changed.
Perhaps that is what I am feeling now. For nearly two years, my mind has been occupied by breast cancer. For most of my ministry, I have been enduring breast cancer treatments in some form. And now suddenly, after April 22, it will be over. Of course I'll still have regular check-ups, but since the summer of 2012, there has always been a procedure or a surgery that has been on the calendar, something to anticipate, and now there will be nothing. And even as that should be a positive thing, when I think of it, I feel a bit of fear.
Someone recently directed me to this fabulous blog called "loving cancer." A young woman with colon cancer reflects on how much she dislikes the imagery of "fighting" cancer, and she would rather approach it with a more positive spin - a chance to learn, to change, to grow. She recently reflected on how the end of treatment feels. It's a thoughtful and honest read, and I encourage you to read it yourself. What spoke the most to me was how during cancer treatments, you take care of yourself and give yourself a break and delegate and forgive yourself for not being tip-top. And when it all ends, how quickly we slip back into our old, unhealthy habits.
For her, the big one is her eating habits. I've been thinking about what it might be for me, and I think it is likely overworking. I am eager to get back to a vocation I love, I am eager to learn an assortment of new skills (it is worth noting here that last Friday, in one day, I learned how to machine quilt - and quilted almost an entire baby quilt - and how to make my own pizza crust!), I am eager to start a family with my husband. But very quickly after returning to work after my last mastectomy, I threw myself back into life with full force... only to find three weeks later that I was exhausted. I have been grateful, to some extent, that I have this one last surgery, one last reminder to relax, to take it easy, to be good to myself. I will once again be forced to lie still on the couch, not exercise too vigorously, and not lift anything too heavy for a few weeks.
But after that... then what? Nothing more to hold me back. Nothing more to save me from my over-zealousness. Is that what causes me to fear? Os is it that cancer has become familiar and now I won't have that familiarity guiding my life plans? Or is it that I felt in such good care through all of this, but after this surgery, I'll be more on my own?
It is probably some combination of all of those. And compounded by the fact that Michael and I will finally be able to start trying to have a family, and when that happens... speaking of learning new skills! I know nothing about babies, except that they poop and cry and sleep a lot and eventually grow into children who are an age I actually do know how to deal with. Cancer - now that was something I knew how to deal with. But babies? Oy...
Oh goodness, I have so many other things floating around in my head that I want to write, but being the week before Holy Week, and the planning that goes with it, I can't formulate my thoughts. Perhaps they will appear in sermons in the coming week! Until then...
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