Getting Used To Not Having Cancer

The other day, as I was sitting in my office writing a report, I glanced at my calendar, and had a minor panic attack.  It was 3:25, and I was supposed to be at my oncologist's office by 3:30.  I had forgotten all about my appointment!  As I dropped everything and raced over there, I thought about how, for the last two years, doctor's appointments were pretty much all I thought about.  They were written in red pen on my calendar, and circled, and highlighted, months in advance.  There was a list, in my head, as well:

Surgery?  Check.
Chemotherapy?  Check.
Radiation? Check.
Reconstruction? Check.
Chemically induced menopause?  Check.
Random Spaz-out?  Double check.

I arrived at the oncologist's office with the realization that I was now more focused on being healthy than on my illnesses. It seemed as though all I ever thought about, for ages, was doctor appointments, surgery appointments.  Anxiety about surgeries.  Anxiety about chemotherapy.  Anxiety about surgical recovery.  Anxiety about just about everything medical that a person can think of.

After two years, I am feeling healthy enough that I remembered more about my son's soccer practices than which doctor I needed to see and when.  With a reference to Ferris Bueller, such a momentous change in perspective, and I almost missed it.  But that's pretty darn wonderful, isn't it?  I'd rather be focused on what's happening around me than doctor's appointments. 

Who wouldn't?

100 Word Challenge: All About Perpective

She closely monitored the other girls and imitated their behavior with careful precision. No matter what she said or did, her classmate's voices murmured at her back like an icy cold wind, until her shoulders hunched with pain.

Where ever Callie went, the whispers followed her.

Weird, peculiar, strange, freakish...  

She could have let those voices linger after high school, shriveling her away to nothing.  Instead, Callie left town for the big city, where her particular peculiarities were discovered by an talent agency.  There were new whispers, murmuring over the surface of her skin.

Extraordinary, exceptional, remarkable...

She was invincible.


Tara over at Thin Spiral Notebook has taken over the 100 Word Challenge!  Go visit! 

Blessings

 

Today’s (completely) optional prompt: Blessings

There are lots of blessings in my life.  I was blessed with two parents who fed and clothed me and never let me get too big for my britches.  I was blessed with a brother, who probably owes me at least a punch or two, who has never collected.  I've been blessed with a great husband, a wonderful child, two cats, a puppy who is probably going to be bigger than me, a job and a roof over our heads.  I have no reason to be discontent with my lot in life. 

Yet occasionally, I wonder.

What if all the adverse events and occurrences in my life were the blessings?  We always associate a blessing with a positive outcome, but what if that's not always the case? What if my miscarriage was a gift?  What if my husband's cancer was actually supposed to be a treasure, cherished beyond measure?   I know there are some people would lose their minds if they knew that I think about things like this, but who am I to say that I know the mind of God?  Or even if that mind is a benevolent one?  Humans have all these ideas and intents and purposes that they ascribe to God's will or his "divine" plan, but really, we know nothing about it.  We truly do not. Anyone who says otherwise is selling something.


So what if a person takes the most horrible, tragic thing that ever happened to them, and looks at that event as a gift instead of misfortune?  It might not make the event less horrific, but maybe it also would reset that trauma, add a different shading to the picture that person carries in their mind.  By changing the perspective a little, maybe it will help a person move forward, instead of staying stuck.


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Batman Saves The Day

I was an all-or-nothing child. Things were either perfect or horribly defective. There was no in-between. There were no shades of gray. My worldview was formed by a need to survive. We moved often, and every time I made friends, I had to leave them and make new ones. My little ego had to form some sort of outer shell to confront the world, because rejection of some form was always just around the corner. If I was perfect, then all would be right with the world. If someone hurt me, I cut them out of my life completely. This does not make for a great social life.

I found solace in books. Lots and lots of books. I read until my head hurt. It was safer to escape in a book like Half Magic or The Secret Garden than to try to make new friends. After I had read every single book in the kid's section of the library on base, my parents started buying me comic books to read. Those were cheaper, my mother said, and I didn't seem to mind reading them over and over.

That's where I found Batman. I adored the Dark Knight from the very first issue I read. He was the only superhero I knew at the time who didn't actually have any superpowers. By sheer will, Bruce Wayne made himself into a hero, the World's Greatest Detective. He was intelligent, but in a way that I had never considered before--he was street smart. Bruce Wayne understood the heart of darkness that is in all of us because it was in his heart as well. He IS the heart of darkness. Batman knew what was out there, and he was ready for it.

Batman isn't really an all-or-nothing type of character, except that he never intentionally kills anyone. He doesn't always do the right thing. Sometimes he is willing to break laws to catch the criminals. He scares the bejeebers out of people on purpose. Technically he IS a criminal, a vigilante. Batman takes the law into his own hands on a regular basis, if it suits his purposes. For Batman, right is relative; the world is full of shades of gray. The ends, getting criminals off the streets, justify the means.

Batman wasn't perfect, but he was still a hero. He certainly changed my perspective. Maybe the world isn't black and white, I realized. All-or-nothing people don't live long in this world. Those comics inspired me: what was I doing hiding in my room? Just because someone I thought was my friend hurt me today didn't mean that they would do the same thing tomorrow. I needed to be out there. I needed to experience the world, learning as much as I could, so I could be ready for anything.

Like Batman. Except for the cape. I don't do capes.