Hope, calm, and serenity ✨

It’s been a while since I last posted, and the time seems to of passed so quickly. I really want to learn to stop living from scan to scan and appointment to appointment, but that seems to be taking a lot of practice!

The past few weeks have been a swirl of scans, ultrasounds, and conversations that sting and also, leave me reflective. The radiographer pressed the ultrasound scanner against my thigh, trying to decide: cyst, or tumour? “It looks different, but it has shadowing like your neck tumour.” Dr Wilson rang me, I told him I was in the infusion ward, he came up to see me, they decided it is melanoma. My gut says it doesn’t feel like the other tumours. It is very very painful, interfering with everything I do, sitting, standing, a constant reminder.

I’ve started to realise how much of life with cancer is lived in the space between certainty and doubt. Oncologists give diaognosis’. Scans light up. Reports use words like stable, progression, suspicious, aggressive. But I’ve learned to listen to my feelings along side all of that.

I’ve been supporting a very good friend of mine, Elizabeth, the cancer she has has taken a turn for the worse, I was shocked….it’s an image I’ll never forget. But I was also so so super proud, deeply proud, as she chose bravery over fear. Bravery isn’t smiling through it, bravery is booking the flight anyway, and off she has gone, to a place where she has the very best chances, alone, but willing to give it EVERYTHING. I can’t wait to see her when she gets back in December. Elizabeth has taught me so much.

At home, the family keeps me grounded. Annabelle in Year 8, Ted in Year 6, Benj in Year 2. School runs and packed lunches, moments of laughter and personality clashes and late nights and early mornings and millions of after school clubs, reminders that life doesn’t pause for cancer. It keeps my happy reality normal, even when my world feels like it’s shifting under my feet.

And then there’s the mask. The social media “norm” of us ‘patients’ smiling from hospital beds, infusion chairs, and hospital waiting rooms. But the truth is….It’s terrifying. Even my friends who are five years all-clear still dread checkups and results. That dread never leaves, the waiting for news.

My last immunotherapy day was long and heavy (there is another one looming!)….canulas, bloods, waiting rooms, sweaty hands waiting for my 15mins with my oncologist, the alarms in the infusion ward. And yet, as we drove home, the most beautiful sunset across the sky over the village we love. Maybe this is what healing really looks like….moments of beauty that happen every single day.

I’ve been to a concert with one of my closest friends…two violins and a cello playing Coldplay inside the church where I was christened. The filled the old stone walls, and I felt completely calm. The music, the candlelight, the quiet….it felt like my mum was there, she would of loved it.

And now, as I write this, I’m unwell again….sore throat, dry cough, taste and smell gone. COVID. The same virus that took my mum. It’s impossible not to feel scared, even 4 years on. But this time is different. My body is stronger now. My life is different. My knowledge is stronger. She would of rreminded me to rest and stay calm. The part of me still healing from her death still needs to happen, and so remembering her, everything about her, and also the way she died is still needed. I miss her so much, and dream about the support she would of given me during this cancer stage of my life.

Grief is huge. Underneath all of it is grief. The grief of watching others flourish while I survive. Lives where careers, body image, face tweaks, holidays, plans made years into the future….while mine has narrowed to cycles of scans, infusions, supplements, and hope. I celebrate them, as my friends mean the world to me, but it hurts too. Living with cancer isn’t just about the tumours in my body…it’s about carrying the constant grief of the life I thought I would have, that I still want.

And still, I wake up each morning.

I show up for my kids.

I choose to believe in healing, even when the scans say its still there.

I hold pride for my friends, like Elizabeth, who teach me daily what courage and bravery look like.

Living with it is messy, painful, hopeful, sometimes full of anger. But it’s real.

Oh, a lady I met, only once, said I was very ‘serene’ and it took my breath away! I’ve been working so hard to calm my whole world down, to remove stress, to not rush, to remove urgency to heal faster, and so her saying that word, felt like the most amazing compliment I could of ever received.

Immuno again this week, I’ll post more often! So much has been happening with #ITSALOT and the kids, but its all settling down now.