My Cancer Journey

A friend posted this prayer on a pinterest board today and it really spoke to me.  I think in this crazy, messed up world we live in we allow our hearts and minds to be filled with knots. Even examining my own life, I realize that I have "can nots" "am nots" and "have nots" that do hold me back. There is a fine line between acknowledging your limitations or weaknesses and them hinder you.  

Tomorrow I celebrate my 24th birthday, and also 2 years of my cancer being in remission.  In the midst of all of the chaos that is currently my life, I am still taking the time to step back and appreciate this.  I definitely don't feel like I'm 24 years old--where has time gone?  I am so thankful to be celebrating another birthday, and to be able to say that I'm still cancer free!  I am blessed in so many ways that I can't even begin to list them. My family, friends, classmates, professors, oncologists, surgeons and therapists played important roles in my journey, and I am so thankful for this. I have been asked many times over the course of my life, "If you could go back in time and change something about your life, would you?"  I usually didn't know how to respond to this question, because maybe it would be cool to go back and undo bad decisions or bad experiences. I've been thinking about this a lot lately, and now I know how...

People often say that you should live life without regrets; I think people who don't have regrets have a unique view on life.  No regrets. Perhaps the only way to live without regret is to accept the things that can't be changed and to live your life with intention. Every decision that we make has consequences and they can be positive or they can be negative.  If we make those decisions with the best intentions, then how likely are we to make the wrong decisions, ones that we might regret?  I’m trying to be thankful for everything good that happens, and for everything bad that does not; slowly I am learning to be thankful for what I learn from the bad things that do happen. For everyone, there are moments in life that we never forget, those defining moments in our lives that have profound impact on us. These moments can be joyful or sad, they can be triumphs and they can be struggles. Each person has their own moments and each person is impacted differently by these ...

February 13, 2012: The entry on March 22nd was the last journal entry I made. Here is a general summary of what happened next... I went off the pain medications after 2 weeks of being home. I went cold turkey, which was a bad idea, but no one instructed me to ween myself off of the pain medications. I think my body went into a little bit of withdrawal, but I worked through it! I spent the next several months recovering from all of the side effects. I couldn't believe how long it took me to recover. And then in December of 2010 I had to have more surgery on my jaw. An MRI scan came back with some unusual spots on it, and I had been having signs of infection for a few months before that.  The antibiotics were not helping, so they decided they needed to go back in. We later found out, after the procedure, that the screws holding the metal plate and my jaw together had come loose. Scary! Glad they fixed it. The recovery from that procedure was much faster, and yes it did req...

March 22, 2010: I am done. Finally, I am done. My birthday was yesterday. Happy 22nd Birthday to me! Not exactly how I imagined my birthday, but at least I am alive to celebrate many more birthdays.  I spent my birthday in bed. My parents let me come home after my last treatment and just sleep the entire day. They are still on my case about eating, or should I say drinking my meals.   I still don’t really have an appetite, and my ability to taste hasn’t come back. I still have the sores in my mouth, so I’m eating liquids for now. I’m still on the weight gain shakes. These are ridiculously unhealthy I think. You mix the powder with 8 ounces of whole milk; total number of calories in one 8 ounce glass is 600. I’m supposed to be having at least 3 of these shakes a day if I want to maintain my weight. They would like me to gain weight. Haha, I have never been told to gain weight in my entire life. Never thought I’d hear that! My ability to talk is still kind of limited...

March 8, 2010: I feel like I’m dying. I know that I’m not, but if I were to imagine what slowly dying was like, this would probably be it. Is this an exaggeration? I don’t know. This is the worst experience I have ever had, and I hope the worst one I will ever have. I have been avoiding taking pain medications, but the pain has gotten worse. I started on hydrocodone, which has since been upgraded to oxycodone and I am also on pain patches.   I have lost a lot of weight, my clothes are loose and I look sick. It hurts to even drink water, much less drink these weight gain shakes the doctors have me on. I don’t want to get out of bed. I’m tired all the time. I can’t really find joy in much. My brother has come to visit me and I don’t even drag myself out of bed to see him. This seems selfish. He drove here to see me, and the least I could do is go downstairs to say hi. I don’t do it, though. I would prefer no visitors at this point. I would prefer to be alone.     ...