Endurance

The instructor in my online workout this morning said something like, “Life doesn’t tell us when the hard things we go through will end. We just have to endure.”

This thought hit deep.

Today, December 5th 2024, marks one year since my surgery. The hard didn’t end that day. It didn’t end when I completed chemo. It didn’t end when my wound finally healed. It didn’t end on my last day of radiation. 

I don’t know if it will ever end. I’m working on shaping my life around the hard. The hard that the big C brought into my life.

And I’ll tell you, it’s really freaking hard!

I haven’t written in a while. Writing brings me peace. It grounds me. But I have to be in the right headspace to write. And while I am fully aware that writing will get me into a better headspace, still I have not written. 

I have been enduring in my head. Quietly. I try not to let others around me know just how much space cancer takes up within me. One year ago, my surgeon cut the cancer out, but today, it has rooted and is taking up so much more than the previously occupied 7 cm in my right breast.

There are phases when it comes to cancer. From my vantage point now, I see the first phase was the battle itself. When I was diagnosed, I strapped myself into the rollercoaster, kept my hands and feet inside at all times, and let the ride carry me. I spent a lot of time at UCSD La Jolla, completed treatment as prescribed. There wasn’t a lot of thought, I just did as I was told.

In many ways this next phase, the living with cancer phase, is much harder. I spend less time at the doctor, so I have more time to think of how I live now, who I am now. My hair may be growing back, but in many ways, I don’t recognize the person I see when I look in the mirror. I have my first post-surgical mammogram in 5 days. The last time I had a first mammogram was also the beginning of my cancer journey. I am afraid.

I know I’m one of the lucky ones. I have so many blessings in my life that bring me joy. And I wish I could let go of the anger and fear and just live in that joy. As I endure, as I learn to accept my role as cancer survivor, as I learn to somehow live with the underlying fear that I could go through this again, I do believe I will find a better balance.

But I’m not going to lie to you. That day is not today. 

One year post-surgery, I am not healed. I know others see me as a warrior, but I don’t. Not yet anyway.

The endurance workout I completed this morning was hard. But it had a timer counting down from 20 minutes. Then it was over. Cancer journey endurance? That’s the real hard. It will not end after 20 minutes, and it goes way beyond physical pain. 

You know what though? You just have to keep showing up. You show up for your workouts, your athletic endurance will improve. I’m a fighter. I will keep showing up for myself. I know if I keep showing up for myself, my endurance as a cancer warrior will improve too.