The Aftermath

14 years Cancer Free. It feels like a miracle sometimes. Especially when I hear of people getting diagnosed with cancer or having it come back after being in remission. Or someone dying from cancer, or losing their breasts, friends losing loved ones to it. I can't believe I was so lucky to have come out relatively unscathed. When I hear any of these things, I count my blessings, I can't help it, I realize at that moment how lucky I was...how lucky I am.

It's funny, even 14 years later when I go in for my yearly check-up, I sigh a little sigh of relief when everything comes back normal. It's not really that I think that there will be something wrong, but it's there...just a little in the back of your head, even if you aren't consciously thinking about it. Knowing everything comes back normal...makes you kind of...go whew, let your breath out, even though you didn't know you were holding it.

I will admit to feeling a big of a..pang I guess the right word is, when I see a pregnant woman or hear of someone getting pregnant, or see a movie about someone being pregnant. It kind of hurts that I will never have that. It's what I had wanted. I wanted to experience being pregnant to talk to Mom about whether my pregnancies were the same as hers, to see if my kids would look like I looked when I was little. It's funny how life just doesn't turn out the way you thought it would.

I know what you are thinking...I can read the thoughts forming in your mind...you can always adopt...it was there, wasn't it? Yes, I know I can, but what I don't think a lot of people get is that I mourn that loss. I sometimes feel that people just see adoption as 'the solution' and it is! I have friends who are adopted and who have adopted it is a wonderful thing and I am not dissing it in any way, shape or form. I just want people to understand that my feelings of not being able to have my own child, of having that choice taken from me at a relatively young age is still painful to deal with. I don't know what my future will bring and I always thought I wanted children, but here I am fast approaching my 40th birthday, still single and I don't want children under those circumstances. If I am going to have children in my life, I would rather have them with someone else in my life. Plus, I don't always have much patience for kids anymore...that's a bad sign! Perhaps I just wasn't cut out to be a mother. That's okay too. They are cute though, aren't they? I still can't resist all those cute little dresses in the kids department. They are so adorable! Maybe I could buy a couple outfits for my cats....perhaps not.

With what I have been through I try, don't always succeed, but I try to not let the 'little stuff' get to me. What could be worse than getting cancer? That was one of the worst days of my life...anything after that is a piece of cake! You have to live life to the fullest, live with no regrets. That's one of the reasons I moved to Mexico. I would rather look back on my life and say 'I did that' than say "What if I had done that?" I want to enjoy my friends, my family, my life, do the the things I enjoy, because I've been given that chance.

Below is one of my favorite 'Motto's of Life'. My body's already been cut up some so I figure I got that part covered.

Motto to Live By: Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in an attractive and well preserved body; but rather to skid in sideways, chocolate in one hand, margarita in the other, body thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and screaming, "Woo Hoo! What a ride!"