Reflections on My 2-year Cancer-versary

I poured myself a glass of vino tonight and retreated to the Research Cave not to do Research, but to relax and reflect on the coming week. 

As you may know, Monday is Martin Luther King Day.   Martin Luther King Day is my two-year Cancerversary.    It was this day two years ago when my endocrinologist called me and told me the cells from my thyroid biopsy were papillary carcinoma.  My total thyroidectomy in March 2010 confirmed the diagnosis of thyroid cancer and my radioactive iodine treatment took place in April.  On July 27, 2011, I received the news that I was on my way to remission, but I celebrate MLK Day 2010, because this is really the day cancer changed my life.

I look back often and remember how I felt that day.  I have said countless times that I truly believed my life would end at that moment.  I was already sick, tired, and overweight, and I was terrified that the removal of my thyroid would only exacerbate these conditions and virtually erase the miserable modicum of fitness I'd spent 4 years achieving.

Instead, the opposite happened.

It hasn't been all sunshine, lollipops and rainbows shooting from a unicorn's ass.  I've had some really difficult moments.  In fact, I minimized this detail, but I was so ill on the drive to the Savannah Marathon in November that I had to nap several times that day and feared for my ability to even begin the race the next day. . . let alone finish (with a 43ish minute PR).

But that's another one of the countless things cancer has taught me: never underestimate yourself.  You can push so much harder and farther than you expect.  Perhaps even more importantly than that: nothing heals like perspective, because the way you feel during one small moment of your life is never indicative of how you will feel forever.  (I try to remember this whenever I have any kind of big decision to make about how something affects me.)  And, maybe even more importantly than that, MLK Day 2010 taught me that the most wonderful and amazing of circumstances can arise from the most frightening and terrible.  Up until that moment in my life, I had been through just about every other terrible thing I could have imagined.

Even though my particular variety of cancer is not life-threatening (now that I have been treated), the last 2 years of my life have taught me that it is never too late, and life is far too short to live without the things you really, truly love.  For me, those things were chasing my dreams of training, racing, education - and making time to live, love, and laugh (and eat!) with my family and family of friends. 

It is important to note that this also included a dose of moderation.  While I was never a party girl (a "late night" for me was anything past midnight), I realized that I would never be as healthy, or feel as healthy, as I could if I indulged in even the moderate level of late nights and alcohol consumption in which I had occasionally indulged before.  So I set myself a new collection of goals, the most important of which was to treat myself well.  That included some time to let loose and drink a glass of vino from time to time. . .  to the extent that I was otherwise healthy and well-rested.

Cancer didn't change anything. It changed everything. 

2 years ago Monday, I set out on a journey that saved my life in every sense of the expression.

This week, more than ever, I am grateful for life, love, and yes, even cancer. Remember, life is too short, so treat yourself well, take every chance to be happy, and chase down your dreams with relentless passion.

That's my plan, anyway.

The Week in Song Lyrics

I will leave you with an early edition of The Week in Song Lyrics.  This week comes to you from the Sixx:A.M. song Life is Beautiful.  They're a bit morbid if you take them literally, but bear with me, because the message is vital.

The song is about how having a brush with death can make you aware of your mortality.  The line with which I identify the most says: "I was waiting for my hearse/what came next was so much worse/it took a funeral to make me feel alive . . ."

When I learned I had cancer, I instantly felt it was like a death sentence.  I was waiting for my hearse; what came next - the prospect of not dying, but instead, living a life crippled by illness and fatigue - was so much worse.  But it took that experience to make me feel alive.

Yes, I feel better because my thyroid never really worked, so being on a regulated dose of thyroid hormone makes a huge difference in how I feel.  And yes, my body works better at fighting off illnesses because it's no longer battling 7 years' worth of cancer cells.  But a lot of it was mental.  A lot of my improvement came from realizing how beautiful life really is; that sometimes you just don't grasp how amazing things are until you've had a brush with how bad they can be.

And that's why I celebrate this coming Monday instead of mourning it.

You can't quit until you try
You can't live until you die
You can't learn to tell the truth until you learn to lie
You can't breathe until you choke
You gotta laugh when you're the joke
There's nothing like a funeral to make you feel
Alive
Just open your eyes
Just open your eyes and see that life is beautiful . . .

I know some things that you don't
And I've don't things that you won't
There's nothing like a trail of blood to find your way back home
I was waiting for my hearse
What came next was so much worse
It took a funeral to make me feel alive
Alive
Just open your eyes
Just open your eyes and see that life is beautiful . . .

Authenticity, uncensored

This blog entry got posted, deleted, edited, and edited some more. But I've decided it's time to just throw it out there and be done with it.

Since I was about 18, in addition to my physical health issues, I've suffered from both disordered eating and major depressive disorder. Some of you know this, some of you don't. I've been on medication on and off, but none of it really helped. I've had some pretty rough nights where some of you have been called or e-mailed or texted while I was in "crisis" mode. Some of you knew it, and some of you didn't.

I've been ashamed to admit that I suffered from yet another illness, especially because there is a stigma attached to mental illness. If you have a therapist, then maybe you're Mariah-Carey-Crazy. But if you have a therapist and a psychiatrist, it takes you up a notch to Britney-Spears-Nuts. Not only that, but I hate playing the part of the invalid, the freak that's sick all the time while everyone else is normal and fun. So I put on a happy face and cover everything up with a lot of crap, because I don't want anyone to think there's anything wrong with me. One of my friends - and I wish I had paid more attention to her at the time - actually told me several months ago, when we were discussing Nationals, that she felt like I was constantly searching for "the next big thing" to cover up some unhappiness in my life. She was actually 100% right and I didn't even know it until it hit me over the head months later.

Clinical depression, as you might know, is more than just "feeling sad." It is an actual, diagnosable, treatable illness - a lifelong and potentially terminal illness, no less serious than cancer or Alzheimer's - that affects your ability to work, study, even breathe on a daily basis. It's often accompanied by a horrible, mind-seizing, body-numbing feeling of not being able to or having the power to do anything about anything in your life. Got 9 loads of laundry, can't do it. Dog is being feisty, can't discipline him. Got homework, it isn't getting done. You feel sad, blue, worthless, down, unhappy or just plain "out of it." You'd do anything to return to your "old self" and find some way to just "be happy." It is not a motivation issue. No amount of desire, list-making, prioritizing or theorizing will get it done, and there's nothing worse than people telling you just to "dig in and get it done," because you're physically incapable of doing it. It's also not an issue of being "negative" or "moody" or a "drama queen."

If this scares you off, or if you now think "I can't read her blog any more because she's got too many issues," then that's your choice. As I've told the few people who really matter, you can, with no hard feelings, be rid of me now. I just can't hide any longer under the pretense of "everything's ok." We all struggle, and too many people live their lives in denial - and, in the process, deprive themselves of the help, life, laughter and love that could bring them out of the dark.

This is something I've battled for most of my life, and I'm not going to fight it silently any more. If that loses me friends or respect, then it's something I'll just have to accept, because those who are closest to me should already know that it isn't easy being me, and it may not be easy being my friend. But at least you know one thing: I'm not hiding anything. And perhaps, through my honesty, I can help someone else who's suffering from the same illness (or family of illnesses) to be honest and accepting of theirs. I know of at least one person whose honesty has inspired me to be more accepting of myself, and at least two people who literally saved my life.

My only two goals in life are (and always have been) to live so that I inspire someone and to always be known as a person who took action. That's what I hope will be my legacy. If, by admitting this, I have somehow helped or inspired even one person, then the work I've set out to do in my life is done. But that doesn't mean my life is done. There's a lot more of that to live.