8 Years Today

I never really thought I would be able to say that it had been 8 years since I was diagnosed with cancer. I remember March 19, 2002 like it was yesterday. I am sure some of you have heard this story and you are going to hear it again. Bear with me.....You know how you sometimes you have a vague feeling that something could go wrong? Maybe not for yourself, but just something out of the ordinary. Well....I remember going for my mammogram appointment that particular Tuesday morning thinking to myself, "I wonder what women do when they get told they have breast cancer". So...I follow the mammogram tech, Deidre, into the testing room. She says to me (in a somewhat nasty tone), "So where is this lump of yours"? I replied, “I have no idea, no one told me I had a lump". All the while I am thinking..."Why don't you look at the chart and figure it out for yourself". Anyway...squish away, both sides and off she goes. Now, I have been in the biz for long enough to know when things are headed south. Well we were headed south as Deidre reentered the room and said, "Ok sweetheart, we are going to need to take some more views". Did she just call me sweetheart? Crap....this can't be good. I knew right then that I was going to find out what a woman does when she is told she has breast cancer. The radiologist told me he thought I had breast cancer that day. I saw my surgeon the day after and had my mastectomy the following day. Whew....We joke (in a somewhat macabre manner) that Heath got his MD and Oncology specialty in those following 48 hours. I think I was almost catatonic at that point and without Heath I might not have made it through those first few days. One bonus though...I did get out of jury duty...just so happens that the one of the town judges lived next door and he excused me. Another bright spot in this whole ordeal was that I really found out how many people loved me and would do anything to make my life easier.
Fast forward 8 years and many adventures later and I think I am doing pretty well. I think my general attitude is pretty good, though of late I could probably be a little more gracious and a lot more thankful. The farther one gets away from a life changing event the harder it seems to channel the good lessons one learned from said event. Instead of New Year’s resolutions I am doing March Musings. This is the best time of year for me to sort myself out, pull up my boot straps and remember that I was one of the lucky ones. I have a plastic container that I kept all my cancer stuff in and on my “Cancer-versary” I look through it, do some boo-hoo’ing, and then pack it away for the next year. One last thing…..I remember asking someone why I had to be the one with breast cancer. She said to me, “It was your turn”. That was something I could understand and it got me through some very rough times.