Here’s a secret: when you first start blogging it’s pretty tough to come up with subjects to write about. Then you get a little bit of leverage, a dash of inspiration, and maybe even a crappy disease, and suddenly, you’re golden! You have a whole list of ideas! That’s what happened to me. It’s for this reason that I’ll follow up my last blog post immediately with the final point of my advice for living successfully with a chronic illness. I have many other subjects to get to and don’t want this final thought to get buried in a bunch of other posts.
Listen, I’d really rather be writing about traveling and writing books, which is what I intended this blog to be about when I first put it together. Thankfully I can still talk about that stuff, but I’ve also been granted this opportunity to help others with my success at battling a chronic disease, so I’m going to take it. It’s certainly helpful to think this way: that this new struggle I’m dealing with is an opportunity, not just a burden. You will need to think this way frequently. To say “always” is not realistic. You can’t do anything always. If you can do it eighty percent of the time you’ll be doing darn good.
To review, my ideas for continuing to thrive with a chronic disease are:
Get the best medical care possible
Find new ways to do what you love
Surround yourself with positivity
And the final point, which I’ll be expanding on today, is:
Don’t let your illness define you
Since announcing that I have cancer I have been labeled as a “warrior,” an ass kicker, and a bitch, (though that’s not a new designation!) and have been glorified, mourned, pitied, bad mouthed, and name-called. Everyone knows what I am, has a character for me to play. Though many of these identities are well meant, what no one really accepts is that the only identity I want to identify with is ME. When you are first diagnosed with a serious illness the processes that you have to go through to continue to function and/or stay alive can strip you of who you are and who you used to be, even though you may look the same on the outside. I consider myself pretty lucky as far as the cancer treatment I’ve received is concerned, but I’ve still had to deal with the biopsies, scans, blood tests, and procedures that leave me bruised temporarily, and sometimes scarred for life. Additionally, through all these the specter of early, sudden, and impending death has bore down on me more often than not. All the while, the biggest struggle has been to find myself again while others label me as something and someone else. No one realizes that while they indicate that I am now somehow “different,” I just want to be the same old me, though with an extra full plate to deal with. It’s because of this that I’ve stopped sharing a lot of my information, though I plan to”come clean” in my next blog posts, however many it may take. (Yeah, maybe more than one. I’ve withheld a lot of gory details.)
My two year “cancerversary” is coming up next month. In the last twenty-three months of my life I’ve been told that I must be “miserable.” (I’m not.) Some have treated me as if nothing is wrong. (Shame on them.) I’ve been counted out. (Sorry to disappoint you. Wait, no I’m not.) Worst of all, some like me better now that I’m “tainted” in their eyes. (They don’t know that I’m still happier than they’ll ever be.) In the pursuit of finding ME again, I’ve had to dodge a hell of a lot of stupidity, hurt, and crisis. Nevertheless, these days I’m hitting ME again pretty closely and sometimes even getting a break from being Cancer Girl. I guess I won’t ever be the same carefree person I was before, but when I think this way I realize: Everyone has their crosses to bear. If I didn’t have cancer I’d be worried about getting old, losing my figure, or not having enough money, things I don’t even think about now. Getting old will be a privilege. Bring it on! My body still looks pretty good, all things considered. And I’ll always figure out how to survive monetarily. Hell, I’ve survived Stage IV lung cancer!
Am I proud of that last point? You bet your bottom dollar I am. Of all the things I’ve been called, “survivor” is the one I accept. On MY terms. Find YOUR terms, and stick with them. Find yourself again, accept the differences, embrace who you are and how much BETTER you are now that you have overcome the disruption of your life.
In the meantime, please enjoy the photos of ME still being ME.
I Am Barb Lee 