Milestone Frankenboob-aversary

This isn’t porn, if that’s what you searched for to get this blog post.

Five years ago I finished radiation, which marked me as clear of breast cancer active treatment. It would’ve been an exciting day had I not been exhausted: I probably napped. You can read about it in the Thus Ends Frankenboob blog post (including a super weird hair-growth picture) if you like.

I don’t know where the five year survival rate even came from, really. Statistics of survivorship, I suppose. There are stats for 10+ years, too, but those don’t seem to be the big celebratory milestones they talk about during your first survivorship chats with oncology, probably because they’re lower (five year survival rate for breast cancer in general, not accounting for type or stage, is 91%. It’s 84% for ten year).

I’m closer to feeling…physically integrated, I guess, than I was five years ago. Usually, this feels like it’s my body, a whole person, not a wayward meatsuit the “person” pilots that harbors an assassin waiting to pounce. Do assassins pounce, like a big-cat-like silently sneaking for a murderous leap? Do assassins butt-wiggle like a cat? I’m intrigued, and digressing. Therapy helps for the body dysmorphia stuff post-cancer, that’s the point I’m meandering toward, but it’s not completely fixed.

Time moves weirdly in survivorship, too. It still often feels like I live from mammogram/Oncologist visit to mammogram/Oncologist visit. Not exactly a Toretto, but short.

Five years went by at both a glacial and light speed pace simultaneously. I’m aware that doesn’t make sense, but it’s how things feel, so of course hitting my five year cancer free anniversary is equally non-sensically contradictory. I feel like celebrating and also superstitiously saying nothing, just like every other cancer milestone. Anxiety around a recurrence is a constant underlying line of stress, sometimes spiking and sometimes so low it’s almost dormant. But it’s always there.

FTR: my oncologist gave me a rather exasperated LOOK about a year after I’d finished treatment and said “you know it’s not coming back, right?” as though this was a done deal. Reassuring, but also not guaranteed.

Originally I’d planned a BIG trip of some sort to celebrate, because it seems as though getting to five years after all horrors of treatment and the roller coaster of survivorship should be an EVENT. Instead, I forgot it was even coming up until I had a reminder on FB today, because 1) it’s already the end of June and I don’t know where the last 2 months went, 2) graduation and author events have fried my brain pan, and 3) we have some large efforts happening between kid trips, college, and work on the house this summer/fall which make a trip impossible. Not gonna lie: there is a part of me that’s really sad about putting off something like this, like it’s a sacrifice I didn’t expect to make on top of the rest of what cancer stole from me. At the same time, I’m rather thrilled with the reasons why it’s put off: five years ago if someone had told me I’d have a bonus family of REALLY FREAKING BUSY teens and an awesome husband (after swearing I’d never get married again) I would’ve snorted in sarcastic disbelief.

• Five years ago I’d just started the proposal plan for what became a published book last spring.
• Five years ago I was under 30k words into a novel, which is now over 70k words.
• Five years ago I was napping for 3 hours by accident (ok that still happens sometimes, not sorry).
• Five years ago today I didn’t have Minerva the super-barker shedding piles of white fluff everywhere (she came closer to my birthday that summer).
• Five years ago I lived in a suburban house too big for me that I loved. Now I’m in a house not quite big enough for 6 people, 2 dogs and a cat, but it’s in the country surrounded by woods, animals for the dogs to holler at, and golfers.

Isn’t it neat that the life I never thought I’d have as a survivor (or not, because there were a few times I didn’t expect to survive anyway) distracted me to the point I forgot the day I was done?

The future looks like a road to travel again instead of a sidewalk that ends at a cliff with no idea how far the fall is. And if I can’t see beyond a hill or curve down the way, at least I have a little more faith that there IS a path beyond what’s in front of my face. And that’s amazing.

If there’s a fancy trip to Switzerland or Ireland/Scotland or Hawaii or Mexico or wherever else I dream about beyond this summer/fall’s construction and school adventures, well that’ll just be a fabulous bonus when I get to planning it.