“A convenient justification betrays a good intention.”
@ThePurposedSailor @AmberHavekost

We’d be wise to consider the ramifications of our justifications when derived from convenience. While we might think they excuse our behavior, they also shed light on lazy intentions. And too many of these chip away at genuine relationship, putting at risk our opportunities for influence. 

*Post 993

Tears :: 12/19/17 :: Post 112

Tears. And a lot of them tonight. Parenting. Food. Exhaustion. 

Done.

Each One The Same But Very Different :: 12/19/18 :: Post 463

This one felt different. I felt like the medical team was focused on other things today…I felt like a box to be checked on their list of things to get out of the way before the holidays. 

Maybe that wasn’t it at all. And I need to be careful of the narrative my own head is writing. And I need to acknowledge my own emotional sensitivities, ESPECIALLY coming off of anesthesia……but today was tough. 

The one consistency of coming out of the surgery-sleep is that I am very emotional. I cry. Every time. But the emotions behind the tears have been different. Today, I didn’t want to wake up, just like last time. It’s so much more peaceful and easy in the sleep. No pain, no sadness, no disappointment, no feeling. There is such a safety there….especially when I’m choosing to feel all the feels. (So much choosing that I don’t know if I am capable of not choosing…)

But today – anger was the main emotion as I came to. I was deeply angry at cancer. At the need for this walk. At the vulnerabilities. At the pain. At the process of getting to the office, getting naked, getting drawn all over, getting told I’m perfectly plump enough to make body with body, getting an IV, walking myself to the OR and laying down on a flat bed while an anesthesiologist once again puts me into a deep sleep, waking up to the realities that await, in a full compression bodysuit with the long road of 30 more 24-7 days of wear, having to manage my expectations and disappointments, having to remain faithful in the process even when I look down and continue to be disappointed, having to accept a body that while I’m grateful for its resilience I am struggling to accept it, having to hold it together so that I don’t take out my internal struggles on those around me who are caring for me so incredibly, being nauseous but hangry, and then having a stupid construction-everywhere-every-bump-huring-long-ass drive home.

UGH.

Tears of anger stain my cheeks tonight….

Thankfully I know that this is all temporary and I know that this will all fade. I’ve walked this recovery road enough to trust that part of the process. How temporary, I don’t know, but there will be an end. Sometime. 

So, I wait it out. I accept and acknowledge the anger and hurt. I feel it deeply. I choose to let it exist. And I remind myself that I am still grateful for many things.

The first few nights of sleep are awful and quite difficult. Here’s to trying to sleep between the fits of hot flashes, night sweats, everywhere body pain and a hurting spirit.

Living Changed Head to Toe Day 19 :: 12/19/19 :: Post 827

I went out to dinner with some friends last night and boy did we laugh. My stomach hurt so bad (and is actually sore from its workout) but it was so worth it. And it was good to laugh that hard. 

My stomach has hurt for other not-so-good reasons, too, though. The emotional gut-punches of ‘you have cancer’ and ‘it’s stage three’ and ‘bilateral mastectomy’ and ‘you’ll need chemo and radiation’ were brutal. There have been times throughout this squall where I wanted to die because of the brutality. Literally Jesus, take me now… 

Physically, the nausea that comes after anesthesia; the nausea that beat me down throughout chemo; the nausea that hit during radiation; the nausea that accompanies traumatic memories……….was and is still almost too much to bear. And it was here that ‘5 minutes at a time’ became a mantra for everything else.

The lose-lose of ‘eat as much as you want because we need fat for reconstruction’ and ‘this food and that food all feed cancer, so you should go on a super strict diet that cuts out everything good’ is a really mind-numbingly confusing tension to try and make sense of.

Living changed head to toe, day 19 – my stomach. The core of myself, the inner parts, my mind and heart and spirit and soul…my ‘gut’ and intuition…all have been massively transformed by this disaster of cancer. But disaster doesn’t always mean destruction beyond repair or hopeless ruin. Disaster sometimes brings with it a new start and a reformed perspective. That of which, I am grateful for. So, I will keep living there and I will know that my gut can withstand much – physically and emotionally. And I will remember the value of 5 minutes at a time.