My sister-in-law called my yesterday. She wanted to know if I was interested in doing a follow-up piece for the Charlotte Woman's magazine she works for. In 2002, I wrote an article for the October, Breast Cancer Month issue, describing what is was like to go through a stem-cell-treatment and recover. I covered areas like how did I come to that decision, how did I get through the tough treatment, and how did I cope?
She now would like me to follow up with a story about what it is like to live with the disease for so long. It will be an article about "the new face of breast cancer." This time, the article will be about how I get through all the tough times...how do I cope...but mostly how do I live.
The article will be a lot about trust. Trust in my incredible medical team. Trust in the amazing ability of the human body to recover from numerous treatments. Trust that the next treatment will leave you better off than the last one. Trust that there is a purpose for you in all this. Trust that this is a life for you to live to the utmost and fullest. And trust, of course, "in the steadfast love of God forever and ever." Psm. 52:8
After volunteering at the Cancer Center yesterday, I had my monthly visit with Janet. I will not know what my marker number will be until today or tomorrow. But I will have to trust, once again, that whatever it is, we have a plan set in place to keep me moving forward. To keep me around and help me live with it. As we sat in the exam room, she had a little trouble entering my treatment option into my file on the computer. This treatment of Xeloda pills will be my ninth chemo regimen since recurrence in 2004. The computer could only take six. Oops.....so sorry to outlive your computer's parameters of possibilities for long-term care and survival. (not!) When you count the five hormonal courses (Tamoxifen, Aromisin, Femera, Fosalodex, Arimedex) there have been a total of fourteen medical treatments for me in almost five years.
Looking back on all that, looking back to times like February 10, 2004, January 2006, July 23. 2007, November 1, 2007.....the times when news was bad and a crack was made in my armour of trust, I am so glad that we.....everyone involved in my love and care....were able to trust in each other and in the Lord that we could all live through it. That I, for some unknown and divine reason have been able to stick around, cope, manage, live my life like always. With faith, enthusiasm, wonder, and trust.
After yesterday's morning of having the privilege of working side-by-side with the wonderful angels in the back treatment room, after my exam with my friend Janet and the computer problem, after the phone call about the follow-up article, I had an hour and a half drive to think about what it has been like, what it means to live with chronic, metastatic disease. I know I will have quite a bit to say. I hope when it is finished and people will read it, it will say all I need to say about faith, love, determination, optimism, trust, and all the people who carry me through my chronic-breast-cancer life. I hope all who read it will see that women are living longer with it, thriving despite it, coping with life just like any one else.
Most of all, I pray and believe that there are and will be many others like me and coming after me who will be sitting in an exam room one day and have to laugh at the computer like Janet and I did and realize that it just might be time to change the parameters that have been set up by that machine...it knows nothing.... and live by the trust we put in the Lord.
Trust in the Lord. That is how I cope. That is how I have come through 14 treatments and all the scans, tests, and news that goes with them. That is how I live.
"Let me hear your steadfast love in the morning, for in you I put my trust. Teach me the way I should go, for to you I lift up my soul." Psalm 143:8
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