Five years.
Five years ago this month I got the devastating news that my cancer was back for the fourth time, but it had spread to my lungs putting me in the category of Stage 4, Metastatic thyroid cancer with distant metastasis. This is rare, occurring in less than 10% of thyroid cancer patients. The statistics are not great; 50% gone in 5 years, 90% gone in 10. I did molecular testing on my tumors and they showed the BRAF v600 mutation (lots of science) but basically, cancers with this mutation tend to be more aggressive. For the first 2 years post diagnosis, I got scans every 3 months, and since scan after scan showed stable disease (tumors still there but not really growing), my scans were spread out to every 6 months alternating between CT and PET scans.
What. A. Ride.
Last Saturday I had my 6-month scan which was delayed from June because of a nationwide CT contrast shortage (yes, there’s even a supply chain shortage on that). Monday, my oncologist sent me a text that everything STILL looks good!! STABLE! I made it into the 50% of patients STILL HERE after FIVE YEARS (Although I know there have been major strides in cancer care in the last 5 years so hopefully the stats are much better now). 5 years ago my youngest son was going into the 9th grade and all I longed for was to be alive at his high school graduation and here he is about to start his sophomore year in college. Now the longing extends to weddings, and dare I say grand babies?
How has my life/perspective changed in the past 5 years? That’s a tough question because my cancer journey started 14 years ago. I feel like cancer has been riding my shoulders forever but the last 5 have been the hardest. Not only the statistic constantly looming in the back of my mind, but that youngest child of mine had a stroke 2 years after that diagnosis, then the year after that we headed straight into this worldwide pandemic. Moving into 2022, I’ve really struggled. The whole ‘being brave and strong and keep pushing forward’ seemed too much and all the stored grief upon grief punched me straight between the eyes. I learned that the research done by Elisabeth Kubler Ross on the stages of grief were mainly on dying people and that we could not apply those same stages to the living. The living has to LIVE with that grief because it is entwined in our bodies, hearts, minds, etc. There is no ‘check the box and be done’ checkmark for denial, anger, etc leading to acceptance, while we’re alive we just weave in and out of those in no particular order. So, some of the lessons?
- Grief lives with us always, but it teaches us about ourselves, as well as our capacity to love
- My faith has become so simple; I believe, and love God and I want to love how Jesus loved. That’s it. Faith is not a building, denomination, or ‘being religious’. (I have lots of thoughts about faith and maybe I’ll write more in a later blog)
- Love lives in the small things, the in between moments of eye contact, lunch dates with friends, a hug, an encouraging text, etc
- Life can change in a blink of an eye
- You can’t stop time so make the most of those minutes. Stay present and notice.
Those are just a few things that come to mind. This year in particular I’ve been the angriest, and the saddest more than I’ve ever been. On a recent podcast, the speaker compared life these days to a tsunami. After the big earthquake a tsunami happens, then it’s waves and waves of aftershocks and destruction, but over time, the waves die down, then things slowly heal and become normal again. We just went through and are going through a global pandemic with the first hit in 2020. The aftershocks and waves are still happening giving us no time to heal; not just waves of Covid surges, we’ve had a war start in Ukraine, civil unrest, mass shootings, so so much. My ‘earthquake’ happened in 2017 with my Stage 4 diagnosis. We have had no time to heal.
Look up
I don’t mean to be trite but one day I was driving in my car, crying (which has been my norm over past months), and completely overwhelmed. After stopping at a stop light, I looked up. The sky was so blue and vast, and I was reminded of how small I was, literally just a speck in comparison. If you haven’t seen the latest images from the James Webb Space Telescope look them up. The universe is SO BIG. Looking up helped me feel better. Looking up reminded me that the God I believe in is SO BIG and that I am so small. That there are numerous unanswerable things in this world and it’s all a hodge podge of joys and sorrows but ultimately, I am so small in this ginormous universe and have very little control if any, of much of anything.
I listen to a podcast hosted by Kelly Corrigan called ‘Kelly Corrigan Wonders’. Every week she does an interview one day, reads an essay she wrote another day, then reads someone’s obituary on yet another day. All of her podcasts are great but the 5-10 minutes reading of someone’s obituary has had the most impact on me. Every week I get to hear a summary of someone’s life written by someone who loved them. All of them speak of the type of person their loved one was along with a smattering of examples like ‘he/she was the life of the party’ or ‘they would literally give the shirt off their back to a stranger,’ but what makes me catch my breath are the simple memories and the small moments like, ‘she made pancakes every Sunday’ or ‘I always came home to a hug no matter what.’ None of the memories spoke of grandiose events or big family trips. Love is in the small moments. What would you like a loved one to write in your obituary about you? I think about that all the time now and try to be that person while I’m living.
I live with Stage 4 cancer as a chronic condition, much like someone who has diabetes or Crohn’s disease. It feels like a double life or split personality most of the time. Acting normal, working out, going out with friends, enjoying life, but every farther future decision is tinged with the question ‘but will I still be here?’ While every daily decision as tinged with ‘is that how I want to spend my minutes?’ or ‘Does that buy me more time with people I love?’ For now, I don’t get to say that I fought cancer and won, the before/after narrative for me is before/during. But gratefully saying I’m stable and ALIVE after 5 years is more than enough 🙂
Starting week 6 of our quarantine but who’s counting and how is everyone? I have to say, I have run through the gamut of emotions. The first week or so I was just busy; busy preparing the house for all of the kids to be back (the older 3 are in college and 1 was studying abroad), getting groceries, preparing the home office to transition to 100% work from home for both me and my husband, etc. The second week was still busy but I felt a little more anxious and maybe depressed. Week 3 was when my anxiety peaked and I think it’s when I cried the most, not to mention I think it may have been the week when all the kids started really getting stir crazy. Remember, they are all older teens and young adults and are all used to their independence so being stuck with all their cars in the driveway is a little crazy. Yes, we have lots of cars in the driveway and street so it looks like we’re having a party…trust me, it’s no party in here.
going to grad school to become a Doctor in Physical Therapy. Here’s the clincher, he was going to start grad school in the fall but recently got accepted to another school he’d rather go to which starts in May…MAY. They have redesigned their first semester to have it all online, then he moves for in person classes for the fall semester (hopefully). It’s a lot all at once. I’m not sad that he’s grown up and moving to another state far away for grad school, I’m grieving the fact that I have Stage 4 cancer and I want to soak in every single moment and my first born child graduating college is a ceremony I just wanted to see, cry, and soak in. Yes, it’s about me, but it’s about him too because I know how hard he has worked to do well and finish an undergrad science degree in the honors college in 4 years. Sigh. This Friday, the university president will have a Facebook live commencement event; thank you social media, he graduates via Facebook.
time he (and I) left the hospital, it was fall. We lost summer. Now with Covid, by the time it’s over, it will probably be summer, so we lost spring too. Here’s the deal, IT’S A BLIP IN TIME and with Stage 4 cancer, I love and LIVE for ALL blips in time and having time in general, by trying to be grateful always, and trying to always find the magic. I emphasize ‘trying’ because it can be really hard sometimes. This is just a blip in time to be a little less selfish and a little more self-less for people like me, or your parents/grandparents, or even for a complete stranger. ‘No one should seek their own good, but the good of others.’~1Cor 10:24
For the last couple of years I’ve lived with a steady undercurrent of uncertainty and occasional fear and sadness from a diagnosis of Stage 4 metastatic cancer. Daily, I have prayed for more time, less fear, maybe for my cancer to miraculously disappear or at the very least, remain stable for the next 50 years. Cancer has forced me to face mortality, the fragility of life, and the real possibility of death sooner rather than later. One author compared living with Stage 4 cancer to walking around with a bomb strapped to your chest not knowing when it may explode. Now add coronavirus.
amazing doctors, nurses, and support staff. About 4 years ago one of my original doctors that helped navigate my cancer journey retired and I cried my eyes out. He was the one who called me with the news that my cancer had returned the 2nd and 3rd time. He researched new therapies and called different surgeons and oncologists; this busy doctor made me feel like I was his only patient for the 6 years that I saw him. I love all of the people that cared/care for me. What a difficult job they have trying to comfort and encourage patients, while also doing their jobs and what’s medically necessary. The impact that caregivers have on our lives is pretty astounding. Having cancer comes with baggage; fear, sadness, uncertainty~ it’s a dark time and medical staff play an important part. No matter what is happening in their lives they are tasked to care and love hard. Dr. M and Dr. D, my prayers are with you and I love you both hard.
part time getting all A’s. He still gets a little tired writing but that is coming along. Here’s my mom struggle…before the stroke he was a normal teen boy doing the push and pull; the pushing of my nerves while trying to pull away into his own adulthood. I get it, I’ve had to let go of my other two and that’s how it goes. After the stroke, he became my baby again. It was an incredibly difficult time and sometimes when I close my eyes I can still see him lying in that bed in the ICU and it makes me cry. There are things I can’t even talk about without choking up including the last night we spent at the hospital together, praying, crying, and talking about all that had transpired, before 
being discharged to come home. Now that he’s about 95% back to being a normal teen boy, there’s that push and pull again, and I have to relearn it. As one radio DJ said, it’s like a hard break up. For me it’s like breaking up, getting back together, then going through an even harder break up again. Makes me sad but I know it’s necessary. Motherhood is hard and time flies. Besides Alex, my oldest is graduating college in a few months and planning grad school farther away, and Audrey is studying overseas this whole semester. It’s a mixed bag of sadness and joy.
what will hopefully be his last procedure having to do with his stroke last summer. Afterward, while Alex was in the recovery room, the doctor came in and told us that all of the vessels in his brain looked normal and that he shouldn’t have another stroke due to AVM in his future. Done. A few hours after leaving the hospital I was alone in my car headed to the grocery store and I started to cry which then turned into weeping. I couldn’t stop. I realized that since Alex’s stroke in August, I was remaining strong and focused on him and his recovery, trying to keep his and my own spirits up, and now, I was letting it all go. All I felt was an overwhelming sense of gratitude. August and September were a blur of worry, grief, and tears and now, these were tears of joy, gratefulness, and relief.
focus on my own stuff, which was kind of a blessing. Here’s the lesson in that, when you focus on others you focus less on yourself, it’s a good thing most of the time. I honestly didn’t even think about my scan until the night before. I got the results today and I’M STILL STABLE!! My cancer is still there but slow growing and as my doctor said in his text, ‘nothing to worry about.’ Tears, actually, lots of tears.
Anna's Lipstick Journey 