Only 5 more days until I am DONE with cancer treatments (woohoo!)
Friday, March 19th will be my LAST radiation treatment.
Radiation has overall gone well. The main side effects have been fatigue and then a sore throat. I feel like a grandma because after treatment (every day at 3:30 pm) I come home, sleep, wake up and eat dinner, and then likely fall asleep again for the night by 8 pm. The brain fog and fatigue are real, almost similar to a miniature migraine. My throat hurts with anything I eat and when not eating or drinking it is sore, so cough drops and honey are my current best friends, or anything soft. This is due to the fact that since the mass in my chest was so large that they are currently radiating, that are also includes my esophagus. Really that means that my throat is essentially being burned to a degree. I will still take these small inconveniences over the retching nauseousness of chemotherapy or all of the other horrors of chemo. These side effects have been met with other unrelated medical ailments. It really feels like there is always something being added to the "list" and nothing really comes off the list. It's a lot to handle. The reality that my body always seems to have something going on can be really discouraging and a negative image. I look at my body and see all the flaws and can make a 15 bullet-pointed list of the health complications in the last 18 months. But what has been redeeming to keep learning is that the Lord purposefully gives us more than we can handle. Just so that he can prove that HE can handle it-not us. I do not have to beat myself up about trying to manage it all because that's the exact thing He wants to do, is handle it all. Sometimes (most times) I hold my grip too tight and learning to release my grip is a struggle. It is also a struggle to face the reality that my body is not what I pictured. My mid-twenties did not come with the "peak of my health" cliche mantra, actually quite the opposite. It is easy to feel broken or less in values when all of a sudden you are the "weak" one. That is not how the Lord sees me. He does not label me by my health flaws, but labels me as HIS DAUGHTER, a daughter of a King. Ryan and others along with many recent situations have been redemptive in reminding me that my body is not defined by flaws and that I am not the weak one, and in this season- it is okay. Hard lessons though, really hard.
Even with my last treatment being Friday, I will not be "done" with the cancer story. I will still have scans and appointments. I will have to have routine flushes of my port (yes Pablo has to stay in until likely the end of the year), and so on. Ultimately my new normal will be check-ups and tests and such which is discouraging to realize this thing called cancer doesn't really "go away" - I just have to adjust to the reality of always having something medical in the back of my head. BUT the cancer cells will be DEAD in my body and hopefully stay that way- that's the victory worth celebrating!
Light at the end of the tunnel, it's coming closer! Maybe that light is an ice cream cone on the other side 👀 😏
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