Six Months? Nah...Try Forever.

As my surgery date approaches, I can't help but wonder if I will ever be done dealing with cancer.

When I was first diagnosed, the doctor tried putting a positive spin on it saying "it's only six months of your life." I was foolish for thinking this was true. It's something I'm going to have to live with forever. And it sucks.

I recently read an article featured in the New York Times by Katherine Russell Rich. She has stage 4 metastatic breast cancer. She was diagnosed seventeen years ago and writes about "living" with cancer, calling it "sluggish but active" and remains in treatment after all these years.

I can't imagine. Or maybe I can.

In October, it will be two years since my diagnosis. The cancer may be gone from my body now (and hopefully forever) but, I too, am still living with it, you know?

I'm reminded every night at 8:00 when I need to take my anti-estrogen meds. And every month when I roll into my oncologist's office for a shot to suppress my ovaries from functioning. Or when I get in the shower and see a four inch scar when I look down. Next, it will be recovering from an oophorectomy. I wish it stopped there.

I admire the author's take on life, saying that it isn't "sensible" and encouraging others to act on "all glimmers that appear" in it. I'm really trying hard to do that. I bask in the moments listening to my little girl belly laugh or sharing in a great conversation with my husband or hanging with my girlfriends. But I can't help but feel like this dark cancer cloud is still hanging over me.

Will it ever go away?

Russell Rich, Katherine. "17 Years Later, Stage 4 Survivor is Savoring a Life Well Lived." New York Times. 26 April 2010. Web. 27 April 2010.