Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

 Wishing all of you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!  I am looking forward to 2022 being an outstanding year for my family and I hope it will be for yours as well.

I have never posted much about health issues and sad things and troubling things but I am going to share something with you today.

In 2013 I was diagnosed with cancer.  I sort of knew I had it but then things progressed to the point that I could no longer ignore it.  I was told that I was lucky because I had the sort that they could get rid of completely, even the very aggressive form that I had.

I had surgery and chemo and for 6.5 -7 years I have been on a drug that, for me, has been very difficult to take. I had many side effects from this drug and, to be honest, I have felt like I was at least 90 years old.  I tried not to complain and I stood the test — it was a 5 year drug, I took it for 6+ and never took a pause.

Last Wednesday, December 15, I had my annual appointment with my oncologist. He told me that it was time for me to “graduate” — one of his favorite terms.  I ask to what?  He said to “not coming here anymore”.  

Did I leap for joy?   Did I hug him and his nurse and throw out a big Hallelujah?  No.  I cried.  He was very taken aback.  He told me that I was cured, it was gone, it wasn’t coming back and I should go live life.  He also told me I could quit taking the difficult med.  Then he bid me adieu and exited the room, leaving me to cope with my feelings. And what were those feelings?

Fear.  Fear of not being part of that “culture” anymore.  Fear of nobody watching over me.  And let down — it was a moment I had been waiting for for 8+ years — I should have been happy and I WAS happy but  that was buried somewhere beneath all of the fear and uncertainty that, at the moment, I was swallowed up in.

I left.  I didnt get to properly thank him for all he had done for me so I wrote him a note.  

For the rest of that day I was in sort of a daze.  I didn’t know what to do with the information I had and the feelings I had.  I decided to just sit and digest it.

That was also the last day I took the difficult med.  It has now been 9 days since I had any and I can feel the side effects waning.  I learned that it would be in my system for 7 to 10 days and that after that I would feel some relief from them.  Some of the longer lasting, more severe side effects would take several weeks to go away.  Almost immediately I felt a difference.  I had been getting progressively more crippled with my arthritis worsening every day.  I couldn’t straighten my knees, I couldn’t straighten my fingers, sweeping the floor reduced me to a puddle of tears because of the back pain, I was hot all the time — hot flash hot — my hair is very thin — and the loss of energy was unbelievable.  

Almost immediately the joint/muscle pain got better.  I am able to walk without a cane/walker, I swept the floor with considerably less pain, I can now make the Girl Scout salute which I haven’t been able to do for years and I am doing things — laundry, cooking, playing with the dog — actually moving around doing things.

So, this Christmas I have received the best gift ever — a clean bill of health and a slow return to a glimpse of my former self.  When I started this journey the one thing that I felt immediately was an overwhelming feeling of gratitude for my doctor, his staff, my family, the air that I was breathing — everything.  Last Wednesday that same intense, overwhelming feeling of gratitude washed over me again.  I hope it never leaves.

So, maybe those weren’t tears of fear and the unknown, maybe they were tears of gratitude and a deeper understanding of the meaning of being blessed.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all!  Make the most of it — I know I am.