I’ve always labelled myself as a pessimist. I am known for my pessimism about everything. I guess I always like to think about and consider the Worst Possible Outcome of everything. Because then, at least it doesn’t creep up and bite me.
Recently, even though I have fears and even though I’ve questioned exactly how long I’m going to be sticking around for, I’ve noticed a quiet optimism. And here is further proof that I don’t really believe I’ll die on June 12th:
Texas Is The Reason
I had a strange conversation with my therapist (she’s specifically a psycho-oncologist but ‘therapist’ will be easier to type for future reference) today. We talked over the last few weeks, because I’ve had to cancel appointments with her due to having to do other things like have CT-PET scans and CT’s with IV Contrasts and Examinations Under Anaesthetic, since my Oncologist found the tumour hadn’t completely gone. I’ve missed talking to her, missed the way she makes me feel like I’m doing ‘OK’. Missed having someone to vocalise my fears to. Today, we talked about whether I should write a Will. And it made me laugh, albeit nervously. Because I’m thirty-six years old, and in one of the possible outcomes of the next few weeks, I’m running out of time to write a Will. I think I’m still in denial about this, even though I keep mentioning it whenever me and C have an argument; that he can have his own way in a month’s time when I’m dead. I saw on the Macmillan facebook feed a few days ago, they were promoting writing Wills, suggesting which services to use, and which were discounted through them. I clicked through the pages, but I still didn’t feel the need to write one.
I don’t really know what this says about me.
Does it mean I am in denial? Does it mean I’m subconsciously optimistic about this? Or does it mean I’m just plain lazy?
I don’t know whether to put it on my To Do List or not.
My therapist says that if I’m wondering whether I need one, then I should probably write one. Just for peace of mind, or whatever. Even though it is a shitty situation for someone my age to find themselves in. I should listen to her, but it seems ridiculous to me still. I’m happy for everything to go to C and our boy. Anything C thinks my mum should have, or anything she wants, I’m sure C will be fine with. So what else do I even put in a Will? Am I supposed to say what kind of funeral I want too? Pick out songs? A venue?
If I start planning to die, then where do I stop?
I started writing on this blog a year or so ago. A lot can change in a year.
Back then, I was mourning the loss of one of my childhood musical heroes to Cancer. Now I have it myself. Back then I was still trying to work out how we would clear our debts. Now we actually have new things, and ‘Savings’. Back then, I was trying to have a baby. Now I’m waiting on an operation in a few weeks to remove the tumour and what is left of my reproductive system post radiotherapy. I know I’m planning for accidents but I think life took this too far.
For the next few weeks at least, life goes on. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t afraid of the prospect of the operation. I’ve watched far too many episodes of Grey’s Anatomy to not be worried now. I’m not afraid of the after effects. Not really. The organs they are planning to take out are of no use to me now. The fact that I may not even wake up at all worries me, but if that happens I won’t know about it anyway, right? What I am afraid of, is that they may need to take out more than planned. Say, if the tumour is impacting my bladder more than they assumed from the CT scan and EUA. Even scarier than that, though, is the thought that they will open me up and see some kind of godawful mess they can’t fix and just close me up again, resigning me to a far shorter life than I had planned.
Today’s Daily Prompt caught my eye: Personal Space. I’m very aware of personal space and invasions of it. Of my personal space, physically. I will visibly cringe if someone sits right next to me on the couch while I’m writing or eating or doing anything other than watching the TV. If there are other places on the sofa available, they are where other people should sit. So I clicked on the link, and found an entirely different context, but one which – if you read my tiny rant of a post yesterday – is still in the forefront of my mind:
“To what extent is your blog a place for your own self-expression and creativity vs. a site designed to attract readers? How do you balance that? If sticking to certain topics and types of posts meant your readership would triple, would you do it?”
I started this blog hoping that people would read it, I guess, but really it was just something I wanted to do so that I could write. I never got around to writing about the theme I chose originally. It was supposed to be a blog by a girl writing about how she was trying to get her ducks and debts in order, in order to feel less reckless about trying to have another child with said mess and debts. We stopped using birth control and planned for an ‘accidental pregnancy’ instead. But things never seem to go right for me and although I did get a visitor growing inside me, it wasn’t a baby – it was Cancer instead. Which after Chemotherapy and Radiotherapy has well and truly quashed the baby plan.
For a while, I kept the Cancer part separate. For six months, in fact. I had a separate blog for it. I didn’t want it to be the depressing theme running through this blog. I didn’t want casual readers to search for one thing and then find the big C instead. I don’t know why. I wasn’t ashamed of it, it was nothing to hide. And in the end I found myself posting more and more on this blog and not being in the state of mind to post on the ‘Cancer blog’, even though I was talking about the same thing.
So I merged the two blogs back into this one. And it feels better to me. And it kind of answers the question of whether I’m in charge of the blog or the blog is in charge of me. This is a place for me to express myself, and if people read it, then that makes my day. Anyone who says they wouldn’t like more followers is lying. Making it more niche, having a proper theme to it, yep – it probably would increase traffic. But if I omitted half the things I wanted to write about for fear of people not liking it, then I would be being less honest. It would be fake. And I can’t see the point of that now. Maybe it’s the Cancer talking, I honestly don’t know, but I’m definitely in more of a ‘take me or leave me, I am what I am’ kind of girl these days.
And so is my blog.
When I first started writing about having Cancer I set up a separate blog to do it on. I didn’t want to bore the people who read my ‘normal’ blog with all of the hard details of being ill. I mean, most people seem to stumble upon it looking up the zebra t-shirt from Whip It that I managed to buy last year. Today I imported the other blog into this one. I am who I am and I’m going through what I’m going through and why should I compartmentalise myself for when a passer-by looking for a t-shirt comes across my page?
Especially seen as this Cancer thing isn’t showing any signs of going away.
I’ve been itching to write something for the whole of my holiday and now I have the time to actually do it I don’t know what I want to say. It’s typical of me. I always want to do something when for whatever reason I can’t. Like I wanted to be making my jewellery the whole time I was in hospital in October, couldn’t get the thought of it out of my head. And now, even though I’ve gone so far as to even buy a kiln and bought more supplies, I haven’t made a single thing. And the de-cluttering. I was so in the mood to throw things away when I was bedridden, but now I have the time and the energy (the energy part is debateable) to do it I’m ignoring it as best I can. There is always something I have to buy first. To move first. To do first. And at the moment, it’s sleep. Okay, and watch Grey’s Anatomy. But mostly sleep. Actually, it’s not even to be asleep, just be in bed, all cosied up, not having to DO anything. Just doing the bare minimum I have to do in order not to get nagged when my husband gets home. I’m not entirely sure how healthy that is, physically or mentally. Maybe it’s something I should bring up on my Wednesday session with my therapist.
I’ve sort of been lying to my therapist. Not outright lies, I suppose. I’ve just omitted the fact that while I like being able to walk the dog, go to the supermarket, play with my child since the effects of the radiotherapy wore off, I also like to spend as much of the day as possible in my pyjamas in bed. I made a kind of breakthrough while I was on the Grey’s Anatomy marathon where I had to watch it downstairs, and I was getting showered and dressed, eating breakfast and dinner and everything. But now it’s gone off the On Demand menu and I have the box sets instead, there’s no urgency for me to have to watch it all day to get through it. No reason for me to have to spend all day downstairs where the neighbours can see me, no reason to have to get dressed properly again. And while I can’t seem to get out of this thing where I spend most of the day in bed, finding it comforting, it’s also annoying me that I had all that drive to do things while I was holed up in the hospital with nothing to so do but lie in bed all day for three weeks and now I do have the time, I’m wasting it.
I’ve wasted a lot of time.
I still have cancer.
When my three-month appointment was cancelled the other week, my very first thought was that they’d seen something on the scan and they needed more time. But I talked myself out of it, saying that if that was the case they’d have spoken to me about it at least. I started to think along with everyone else around me that it meant I was getting good news. That I’d beaten it, that maybe someone else who needed the appointment more than me had bumped me out of my slot. But no, that wasn’t the case. My gut feeling had been right, my scans and records had gone to back to the MDT and now I’m back in as a patient again. I have a new consultant who I’ll see on the 25th April to discuss the removal of the remnants of the tumour by way of a radical hysterectomy, as they would have in October had the tumour not been so big. Now it’s only 1-1.3cm in size and they’re going to operate on me. I guess this is the part where I wish I hadn’t watched so much Grey’s Anatomy the last few weeks.
I’m on my last day of a holiday today. I found out that I still had the tumour the day before we left and I guess it’s been hard for me to relax after that. I’ve been putting on a brave face as much as I can but I guess thinking of going home in the morning is making me think more of what I’m going home to. I need to get my act together. I need to start the things I want to finish. I need to get my house in order because after this operation I’m going to be tired all over again for between six to eight weeks and I’m going to be kicking myself again.
Though as the Queen of Procrastination, maybe a kick is what I need
a letter came through this afternoon from The Christie telling me that my appointment for tomorrow has been cancelled and instead i have one on the 4th April instead. two more weeks of waiting. it’s torture.
i’m going to have to get over my thing of not doing stuff before i find out what the Cancer situation is, because it could go on forever at this rate and nothing will ever get done. also, if it’s bad news i guess i won’t want or be able to do any of the things anyway, right?
i might need to make another new list.
