Cancer.

A word that most people don’t like to talk about. Because behind the word, comes a whole host of scariness. It’s a word that brings  fear, darkness, and sometimes death. And to some, it’s a word that also brings hope, determination, and strength.  Cancer. It’s like a storm. A tornado that comes to wreck everything in its path. You seek shelter to try to escape it, you do everything possible to try to survive it, but ultimately its own force decides what it will do. This storm takes everything from those it seeks to destroy. And the ones who are lucky enough to survive it, are left battered and broken, and in the end have to rise up to be able to fight and find their way back. That’s cancer. And when those people who’s lives have been shattered from this tornado are able to start picking up the pieces, they know they will have a long way to go until they can rebuild. Their inner strength and the will to live and come back stronger and not let this tornado, that they were so lucky enough to survive, ruin their lives anymore are their driving force. Their spouses, their children, their parents, their siblings and friends and everyone within their circle come together to help rebuild. But the rebuilding doesn’t happen over night. It might not happen over a few months.  It might even take a few years, depending on how much this storm took from you. During the rebuilding process, there are other things to be taken into consideration as well. Not only the physical strain that this storm put on you, but the mental and emotional toll it takes as well. And once you rebuild and are standing once again, the physical ailments, the mental and emotional part, really never ever leaves you. You went through a tragedy. A trauma. Something that is so very hard to come back from. Because even though you might be ok now, those memories always remain. The triggers, the flashbacks, the brain memory, muscle memory, the emotional impact this storm had on you and everyone around you. You are now on the other side of this storm, but there’s still a lot to deal with inside you. Overtime, maybe they start to fade and the memories and triggers will happen less often, but the fear you now live with of it happening again, is something that you struggle to overcome. Picking up these pieces, that I was lucky enough to be able to pick up, took everything I had in me. And if I had to do it again, I’d do it all the same way to ensure that I survived this. But sometimes surviving the storm is by chance. And I’m not ready to do it again and I’m not prepared for the alternative. No one ever is, but how many can say they saw the face of evil first hand and know what it looks like and know that it is something that can happen again? The thing that differs between a tornado and cancer? Well, maybe that depending on where you live, if you live in an area that is prone to these storms maybe you can relocate.  Find a safer place to live. Maybe you can find better material to rebuild your house with if you can’t relocate. Cancer - you cant move out of its path. Cancer isn’t something we can run, hide, or seek shelter from. It’s something that can happen again no matter how hard we try to keep it away. It’s something we have to learn to live with - the mental, emotional and physical toll it takes on our entire being and the fear that it can come back at anytime. The everyday pain we live with from our treatments and surgeries are always constant reminders of the battle we once fought within our own bodies. Our own bodies tried to kill us.

I’m lucky enough to have been able to survive the storm and I’m so grateful to be almost on the other side of it now. But everyday I’m still continuing to pick up the pieces. I think I will be for a long time to come. And I just have to keep my head up and pray every day that another one doesn’t come. 💗