I look back on it now and think that it was a surreal 6 months. I saw a picture of myself without hair the other day and just felt sad - it was like another me that I pitied, empathised with and didn't want to be again.
It's not been easy, readjusting to your "old" new life, post cancer. You can find yourself feeling rudderless, confused, misunderstood.
After the initial blaze of relief (not celebration; it's important to remember that, you've lived with it for so long that celebration is rarely what you feel after the all clear, more a "thank [insert god/expletive] that's all over") came the need to reassert control over my life. But it's hard, so hard - you feel like you want to make up for the lost months, go full pelt and try to make yourself the life you promised yourself when you were sick. That impulse becomes overwhelming and overbearing.
However, most people don't really understand this. I'd sat through horrific things, and I returned to work full time to hear people expressing serious discontent about trivial things; I reremembered the ludicrous politics; the rat race of everyone trying to climb the greasy pole. And I recoiled, I honestly did, thinking "you all have no idea". I wanted to improve, to be the best me. You want change, but you only upset people in your haste to make it happen. The world had moved on whilst I hairless, and I didn't feel like I was rewarded for what I'd gone through.
When this all came to a head, I was feeling a bit upset a little while ago and had a week off to recollect. I'm so thankful I did. In that week I did nothing - no thinking about the future, no despair at my disassociation from what I'm doing at work, no pressure. And I relaxed, exhaled and felt for the first time in a while that, yeah - it's all going to be okay.
Because cancer scars you. Physically, I have the big cut across my neck from my biopsy. I still itch and become super paranoid when I do. I have sleepless nights. Beneath my skin, I have big lumpy scars in the places that the nodes once were, that still give me a fright sometimes. Mentally, I fear more than anything it coming back. I'm trying to cut out a nervous tick that sees me touch my neck constantly.
But you can't help but move on. Time is always the healer.
In the last few months there have been shining positives. A lovely person has come into my life which makes me smile. My amazing friends are still there, as they always have been, for me. My family have been absolutely incredible in their unflinching support for me - my Mum, Dad, sister and Nan were with me every step of the way and I cannot express, even in words (lucidity of articulation being one of my key attributes) how thankful I am to them for everything they have done for me, unselfishly and unconditionally. Plus all other extended family members for their loving, unstinting support. And I've been taken onto a prestigious programme which is very exciting. I'm more confident in myself (oh dear, I'm sure you all sigh :) ), what I want to do and am even less afraid of what other people think of me. More changes are in the offing.
I'm now moving towards where I want to be - it's been slow, arduous and occasionally frightening. In a while, I'm sure it'll become less and less prominent in my thoughts. I'm working on it, and I'll get there. I'm alright now - it's just a case of me and myself coming to accept it.
