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Following on the heels of my third blog anniversary, today is another anniversary of sorts. A year ago today I woke up feeling awful, with terrible stomach cramps. At first I put it down to having had a bit too much vino with my friend Judy the night before. Little did I know that my life was about to totally change forever. So on this first cancer anniversary I am taking stock…

I’ve been told not to believe in statistics, but people only tend to say that when the statistics aren’t in your favour. As it stands I was told last year that having stage IV colon cancer with metastasis gave me about a 50/50 chance of surviving five more years. With chemo I think it only gives me another 5%. And now that I’ve survived one year … I dunno, not very good at math. Is it still 50/50 for four more years or what?

And seriously, if one more person drags out the “any of us might get hit by a bus tomorrow” platitude I will give them a virtual smack upside the head. Because you can say that all you want, but until your body has turned into a time bomb and your life has actually been threatened and you really (not just hypothetically) might not live another year … well, until then it’s just words.

What can I say –  it’s been one helluva year. A lot of you have been with me on the rollercoaster ride, for which I am very grateful. And it hasn’t been all bad. I’ve had some wonderful experiences with friends (I even went to Morocco!) and have really learned a lot. I’ve discovered strengths I didn’t know I had, and I have also been revisited by old ghosts that I thought I’d put to rest long ago. You see, fear is something I thought I’d learned to live with. I’ve woken up afraid almost every day of my life, which is what growing up with two chaotic and violent alcoholic parents will do to a person. As a kid it was all-consuming. As an adult I learned to compartmentalise things, including how I reacted to the fear. And so, while the fear itself was always there lurking, it was (mostly) contained.

Until I was told I was going to die.

So a lot of the rollercoaster ride was taken alone, usually in the wee hours as I lay awake trying to pull myself together and make sense of things. Not the “why me?” kind of crap. More like … what can I learn from this? what possible good can come from me going through this hell? And all the time the FEAR was there dragging me down … well, it still is sometimes. But there has been a noticable change of late. And since it is my anniversary I’ve decided to give it personal meaning by making a few promises to myself and do my damndest to keep them.

For the record though, I have always found it difficult to ask for help. This has not changed, and frankly, I don’t see it changing. Especially when I have asked once, twice … it’s just not okay for me to have to keep asking people for favours. I mean, they are fully aware that I’m sitting at home here every day not knowing how the hell I’m going to get to the hospital or find enough work to live on.  They know I’m scared and also lonely. I’m telling ya, that’s one thing about cancer that you don’t often read about … it is as lonely as a winter night on Jupiter.

So I am not going to be the person to pick up the phone or send the email, because there are limits and that is one of mine. I have learned to ask for help, but I will not beg.

Otherwise and that, not sweating the small stuff is one of my new mottos. Unfortunately, not being able to pay your rent doesn’t fall under that category. This is where I fall down. Like I’ve said before, I can just about manage coping with having cancer and all that entails, and I could also deal with scrambling to get work and set myself up in some sort of business (gawd knows I’ve done it often enough) … but having to do both at the same time is too much for me. It really is. I am overfuckingwhelmed.

I was in a really bad way after the last infusion. I felt so bloody sick. I had no energy reserves … everything felt used up.  And on top of that the terrible lonliness. And I thought that maybe I should just die now because I couldn’t see any way of pulling my life back together in terms of work and being able to support myself. I couldn’t see that I really had any future. And I certainly had no wherewithall to make anything happen. Of course, the flaw in that plan is that I don’t actually want to die. I don’t. I just can’t see how to go on living. Sometimes.

And then Azar will scramble onto the bed with me and snuggle up in the crook of my arm and lay his little head on my shoulder, purring away … and there is noplace else I’d rather be and I know I’ll fight and fight to keep having more moments like that. This poem means so much more to me now than when I posted it last summer. I am truly “planting my own garden and decorating my own soul” these days.

A year ago today I woke up with pain instead of fear, and my life changed forever. I’m really hoping that before it all ends I will actually become someone I can feel proud of being. And so I thought I would celebrate this anniversary by starting to become that person today.

Some “beginning of the story” posts for anyone who missed them …