11.16.2015

What Life Looks Like Now

It's been two months since my last blog post and I've been having mixed feelings about it!

Part of me is so happy that I have taken my life back. I have really been able to relax over the last month. I've started feeling like myself again. I also started back to work!

The other part of me is so sad, because I truly love to blog and connect with those of you that take the time to peek into my crazy life.

I've had a few people ask me how life has been and how the transition from bed-ridden cancer diagnosis to a full return to work (more like, return to life!) has been. So, as I'm off on this beautiful November day, I was sitting in my reading chair and thought I would write you up a post about what my post cancer life is looking like!

I spent the majority of the last two months indulging in all of my favourite things. I got to take a fall cottage getaway with my best friends, have a crazy Halloween, spend Thanksgiving being EXTRA grateful this year with my family and friends, watch two of our best friends get married, and of course, plan and execute some absolutely fantastic fundraisers in benefit of the Run for the Cure. I'm so happy to report that my team was able to raise over $10 000 for cancer research. I was so proud and received such amazing closure that day. I truly learned that fundraising is a real skill and learned SO much. Mainly, starting our campaign earlier to avoid September burnout like this year...........



 

I have been listening to new music and rediscovering the old (new Ellie Goulding, the Amy Winehouse obsession is back, and of course some new One Direction ). I'm realizing how relaxing cooking can be, and continuing in the habit of reading 4 different books at a time and getting all my story-lines occasionally mixed up.

 
 

However, life is life, so unfortunately it hasn't been all smiles! I actually struggled quite a bit since my last blog post. Losing a friend to cancer makes the reality of this disease very, very real. It was not something that you just get over. It makes you question everything, and, ask "Why me?" for the umpteenth time (Why Me? seems to be a recurring question on this blog. If I didn't already have a perfectly fitting name I would just name this blog "Why Me?"). In honour of this, I made a little list of the top 5 struggles I've personally had in my return to life post-cancer diagnosis.

Top 5 Post-Cancer Struggles

1) Anxiety

It isn't the kind of anxiety over having a zit or wondering why someone isn't texting you back. It is real, full blown,  can't breath panic type anxiety that hits you when you least expect it. Namely staring at your ceiling at 3AM when your cats just won't shut the hell up and you've been googling "why is my hand numb" and you're on page 44 of a thread on WebMD and everyone is telling you that you've developed a second cancer.

You realize you took this whole year to rid your body of cancer only to realize that for the rest of your life you're going to live with the notion that it could come back.

I first started having this worry when I put all of my beautiful chemo hats in a box to take to donate to the cancer center. I started thinking, maybe I shouldn't part with these. Maybe I may need them again. Then I started looking at my wig, my bestie for those few months last winter, and I had to stow her back under my bed. I kept saying, you just never know. I ended up having the courage to donate the hats, but the wig still sits under my bed. I'm just not ready yet.

I had these really crazy shoulder pains for awhile that I was sure were bone pain, an early sign of stage 4 cancer. I had ghost pains in my breast that had been removed. Some nights, I couldn't sleep with the anxiety that I was sure my cancer had returned.

I've heard from others that the nerves, while they never disappear, will lessen as your life becomes less "cancer' consumed. It's important to remember the feeling is normal and when you're having any concerns your oncologist is usually more then open to checking it out.

2) A deep sense of loss

It was 5AM, I was walking to the bus to go to work, and I had this deep feeling of sadness come over me. It just seems to hit sometimes. The whole, "I cannot believe I actually just had cancer" thing. Telling someone the other day "On Christmas last year I was recovering from chemotherapy" just seemed like the craziest thing. I am still in shock that this whole year even happened to me.

I get that kind of feeling in your stomach that you get when you're in a big fight with a friend or you've had a really bad breakup or you've lost a pet. I am seriously mourning my cancer. I spent a whole year living with it, battling it every single morning when I woke up, wondering what side effect or appointment I would have next.

This morning, I officially closed my file with CCAC which provided me home care. I don't need care anymore, because I'm in the clear. It just feels like I am moving on from what was such a big part of my life for the past year, and I never want to forget how hard it was.

Sometimes I go a full day where I haven't even thought about my cancer at all. Then I feel so guilty. I feel like I'm doing a disservice to myself, and everything I've been through, to just move on.

3) Aches & Pains

Okay so if you're like me and had a hard time with bone and joint pain during your chemo, chances are you weren't the most active. I had the hardest time returning back to work for my first 3 shifts. After my first day I literally felt like I had done the toughest work out of all time (and one time way back when I had done the Gillian Micheals Shred, and I couldn't even sit on the toilet for a week and I think it was actually worse then that).

My body isn't in the shape it was when this all started. I am realizing how HARD it is to get back into shape once you're out of shape. It seriously sucks. Getting winded running up a set of stairs? My life, every.single.day.

4) Struggling To Do It All

Okay, so this is something I seem to be continuously learning and re-visiting so it may be a life long lesson for me.

I signed up for a course at Algonquin back in August: History of Furniture and Design. It was Thursday nights from 7-10. Most people in the course were going for their diploma in Interior Decorating. I was just doing it for... fun.

Until I went back to work, I was exhausted, and the idea of being in class until 10PM and then going to work for 6AM seemed ridiculous.

I started reading this book called Essentialism where I found the following image:


I realized this is a good example of my life. I am interested in so many different things, and I invest all of this time into learning a little bit about everything. I realized that even with this course, I wouldn't become an expert on the History of Furniture, even though I was spending 3 hours in class and about 3 hours on homework per week.

I decided I wanted to invest all of my time into my return to work and my recovery. Returning to work after a year off would be a learning curve as is. When you're me, and you realize the way you were working was all wrong and you essentially need to change everything you were doing, it's a REAL learning curve.

So, I dropped my course. Surprisingly, I did so with very little guilt. I was missing reading books for fun. I learned SO much in the few weeks I was there, and it is something I would like to pick back up again later in life, but the timing was all wrong.

You can't do it all. Sometimes you have to focus your energies on becoming an expert on one thing then being somewhat knowledgeable on a bunch of different subjects.

5) Getting back Into a Routine

I spent a year either sick and in bed, sleeping in until 11 and staying up until 4, and basically doing whatever in the heck made me feel better at the time being (because I had cancer so that basically gave me a free pass to eat chips in bed and re-watch all 10 seasons of ER).

That being said, it was always hard for me to have nothing to do most days, when all of my friends and family were working. I felt very inadequate and unproductive. So, I thought I would love getting back into a routine!

And I have, don't get me wrong! I am loving having a reason to wake up in the morning again. I went back to work nervous I wouldn't love it anymore, that I changed so much over this year and it wouldn't be a good fit. I went back and felt the opposite. I loved it more then ever.

That doesn't mean that the whole waking up early, working hard and giving up the freedom of cancer life has been easy though! Balancing life and work is hard - now I remember why I was no good at it!

Unplugging after work is something that is still very hard for me. We're all so connected through e-mail, text and our cell phones that I find it hard to "turn off" sometimes when I'm at home. I don't think this is a cancer thing. This is just a life thing that I find I'm still struggling with.

So many of you were so concerned about my work pattern and how I would transition when I returned. Seriously, my first day back I think I counted like 18 messages of people ensuring I wasn't falling back into bad habits.

I'm happy to say that with integrating a planner and organizing my day before I fall asleep I have been able to accomplish more then I ever have, and in less time.

So... everyone. Back off! (Kidding. Love you. But seriously. I am fine.)

  

In other news, "The Un-Organized Mind" was named the blog of the month by Rethink Breast Cancer. Super exciting!! So for all you new readers... Hi!

Despite struggling a bit, I've declared this "the winter of soup" and have started by making a spicy hot & sour soup, a potato soup and a hearty winter stew. Turns out when your hands are full of food and your timer is going off, you don't have as much time to look at your phone so it's a healthy way to relax. Plus, now Jeff can't tell everyone that I've never made him a meal in the 6.5 years we've been together!

I've also been reading quite a few good books, one of which I mentioned above called "Essentialism" which I'd recommend you check out if you find you're working so hard and never feeling very productive. It teaches the art of saying no and prioritizing, so you can complete your best work. If you're looking for a funny but rewarding read, check out "Furiously Happy" by Jenny Lawson. A hilarious take on mental illness (with a great message).

This Saturday I'm getting dressed up for a nice dinner with friends and a party back at our apartment to celebrate my birthday. It feels pretty surreal that my one year cancer-versary is coming up. It feels like it's gone by so fast until I close my eyes and remember how bad the hot flashes were and that feels like forever ago. I would rather not live till I'm 50 then go through menopause and have hot flashes again. KIDDING. Bring on the hot flashes, as I've heard 50 is the new 20.

 Oh, and I should probably tell you: had my first post-cancer mammo and I'm still in the clear. Six more months of living cancer-free! Now that's something to celebrate!

 
Saying Hello from my Herceptin treatment!

xx

Sam

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