July 29, 2004
You have the good cancer?
I remember at one point in the early stages of my diagnosis sitting around a table and the doctor telling me I had cancer but they were not sure what kind. They were checking me for breast, melanoma and lymphoma and if I was "Lucky" it would be lymphoma. Lucky, lucky to have cancer that just sounds so ironic, at the time I was thinking are you out of your mind?
One year later, I look at the experience in a whole different way, and I do feel lucky and when people ask me about my cancer I tell them what an amazing experience it was for me. I have changed a lot in the past year and half in many different ways. I know I am blessed for the experience that I have had and for some the experience is different and sometimes painful. We are all unique in how we experience life.
I would go to my cancer center and look around at all the different types of people and I could feel the fear and uncertainty that they were experiencing. When first diagnosed with cancer death is the first thought for a lot of people. But what I realized is cancer just brings on an awareness of our own mortality, nothing has changed regarding the fact that we are going to die, cancer just triggers a greater awareness of fact. I started to realize during this time that I was probably more likely to die driving around in my car everyday then for the cancer to kill me. Nothing had changed. Death is always there. We never know when it's coming, and that is OK.
Posted by Monica L. on July 29, 2004 09:21 AM
My husband was diagnosed with Hodgkin's in October of 2000. We were 'lucky' too. In the end, we did feel lucky, of all the lessons that cancer brought with everything else. It still hurt hearing them say that though. 4 years later and he is still cancer free. I hope we're still lucky not to get it back. :)
Posted by: HeatherLeigh at August 2, 2004 06:07 AM