I cried today. My sluggish brain is so frustrating. Even right now, as I sit here and write, the fog is thick. Words and process, stuck. I feel like my brain is fumbling around in a low-visibility density, grasping at the air just hoping for a hand to connect with something concrete. My eyes are watery and heavy-lidded, my shoulders are sore and my neck is tight – my frustration causing fatigue and tension in my entire body.

It takes me longer to process a simple statement. It takes more effort to picture or visualize something to better understand it. It takes more concentration to commit things to memory and it is harder to keep things there. The capacity I once had to hold many things at one time, to manage ping-ponging from one thing to another is drastically reduced. And I struggle with this loss. Big time.

I do want to live simpler. And I don’t want to fill my brain as much as I once did, nor do I want to constantly test it’s capacity to it’s max like I used to…

…But.

I cried today. My sluggish, foggy, weary, cancer-changed brain is so frustrating.

*Post 937

Weary :: 10/28/17 :: Post 61

The week has caught up with me and I sit here, in my chair, crying. It is reminiscent of the few days after surgery where I just sat here, in this same chair, and just cried. Not many words. Just tears.

Tonight, the same. Not many words…just tears. Tears falling for each loss I’ve had to endure. Tears falling out of pure exhaustion. I’m tired of every day bringing a whole new hardness that I have to navigate. I’m tired of not having a break from each day’s difficulties. I’m tired of being so sick.

I write that word – “sick” – and my heart grieves. Because I am. My body is so sick it had to give up a whole body part…and likely another. My body is so sick that I have to pump it full of poison [for a year] to make it better…and even after that there is no guarantee. My body is so sick that it has to have all of its good cells killed off with all of the bad ones. My body is so sick that I have to look sick to the people around me. My body is so sick that it feels sick, even when it’s feeling good.

I am reminded tonight of just how sick I am. I am reminded tonight of just how much cancer has taken from me. I am reminded tonight just how devastating cancer is to my body, heart and mind. I am reminded because of all that I endured just this past week alone, not to mention the past 10.

I am weary.

I am weary of being in pain. Of having to be careful of what I eat. Of having stomach aches all of the time. Of not sleeping well.Ever. Of daily headaches. Of having to ask for help. Of having to give up a routine that I loved for a new routine that I hate.

I am weary of being resilient.

I am weary of being brave.

I am weary of enduring.

I am weary but not defeated. I will remain resilient and brave and I will keep enduring. But good gracious there is so much that lies ahead. And tonight, that feels astronomically hard.

Rich :: 10/28/18 :: Post 410

Oh so much on my heart tonight.

I started the day at church and while sitting there, I wrote out all of the things good that I can see, both in spite of and because of cancer. It was an interesting list. And quite powerful.

This afternoon I had a girls day with some beautiful women that I hold dear to my heart. The realness in that group does my soul so good even though we bare our souls and it’s not always pretty. Such treasured friends and precious stories.

This evening, a small group gathering that reminds me how critical community is. I love these people, I’m grateful we were invited in several years ago, and I’m forever changed by these vital relationships.

Tonight, after all of that, we come home to my parents’ house as they have opened it up to us once again as we continue the saga of house buying and selling. The generosity is astounding. The gift of hospitality is massive. The gratitude, impossible to express.

I’m exhausted. My body hurts. My soul is heavy. My heart is full. Yet I am so thankful that the Lord has taught me how to live richly by experiencing things fully. Even when it’s hard as hell.

October 28 of 31 :: 10/28/19 :: Post 773

This may not be my most popular post… but just now, as I was sitting here, the thought of death came to my head.

At diagnosis, I had to consider death in a new perspective. I had to look at it in a new light. I had to accept it in a new way. At that time, it felt a lot closer than it ever had. Especially with the car accident just a week and a half prior…. Throughout surgeries and treatment, death was never far from my mind. I’d go in for a surgery with the acceptance that I may not come out. I’d lay in bed during the hell of chemo wishing for it. I’d wonder, as I was being seared by radiation, if each click and hum was taking years off of my life. As I enter this survivorship phase, death feels different. It doesn’t feel as imminent as it did during diagnosis. It doesn’t feel as close as it did during treatment. Instead it feels motivating. How will I live to die? What will I do with whatever time I have left? Turns out – the reality is that I didn’t survive cancer to ‘win’ a longer life. I didn’t ‘earn’ an easier death because I battled hard now. Tomorrow still isn’t guaranteed for me….

I guess I just found it interesting that as I’m living as fully as possible in the space between the memory and the what-if, death is my motivator. I am not afraid of it. While I may not know the how, I do know it is coming. And it will be welcomed because I exist in a win-win.

I certainly don’t mean to minimize the hurt and grief of death, that is not my heart. And I deeply grieve over my own losses in my life because being the one who has to say goodbye is desperately hard. I just acknowledge death a little differently now and hold it in a different space because I had to look it straight in the eyes.

Breast Cancer Awareness Month…

…Day twenty-eight – Cancer is devastating for the care givers, too….and the manifestation of just what cancer does to a family comes years later.