Hello readers - if anyone's out there! It's been a while.
I'm surprised and delighted to note that some of you from far-flung corners of the globe are still reading my abandoned ramblings, even though my blog has been frozen in time for years. I often wonder if you found me because you've been touched by cancer too, and how you're doing now. And while I'm grateful to report that I still have NED, cancer has indeed come both creeping and crashing back into my life through people I love.
In recent years, I've learnt what it's like to watch those I cherish endure malignant torture with all its disgusting surprises, as well as the necessarily brutal adversary of treatment. It's horrible on the side-lines, watching with an insider's understanding while friends and relatives suffer, gaining the insight of a helpless bystander from the other side of the fence. But however hard it is to watch, I know it's nothing compared to what it's like going through it. So I'll watch and support with my eyes wide open, and I won't step back as long as I'm needed.
It will be 20 years since my first cancer diagnosis in 2025, and 15 years since my second. So two big Cancervesaries coming up. That puts me in the category of 49.7% of people who survive for 20 years after a diagnosis of node-positive breast cancer. Despite the remission and generous bonus years, I still live on that knife edge, wondering if - or when - cancer will return for a third time.
When I was pregnant with my second daughter and diagnosed with a recurrence, I bargained with myself. If I could live just long enough to give birth, I would be satisfied. I'd pass on the baton of life and my job would be done; at least the nature part completed, just nurturers to be decided.
But when I'd given birth and then my daughter reached a series of milestones: six weeks, six months, a year... I continued to bargain. If I could just live to see her first day at school. And then I wanted her fifth birthday, and then greedily her tenth, and suddenly here we are at more than 14 years, with her big sister nearly 17.
So where should my expectation go from here?
I've been incredibly lucky to survive long enough for my children to be teenagers. While I very much hope to be around for decades to come, I no longer feel entitled to a life that was never rightfully 'mine'. And I trust my family will be ok without me. I wrote about entitlement in It's a gift back in 2011 when the news was still raw, and the feeling has matured and mellowed since then. Cancer treatments have improved outcomes so greatly over the last 20 years, and given so much time to individuals living with cancer that I dare to free my dormant inner-optimist, and hope and plan for another decade myself. And if that's not to be, at least I didn't waste any precious time worrying.
