The Finish Line Is Right There ... & I don't like it!

Recently things have been weird and by weird, I mean my mind has been working overtime to try and work out where I am at. The shit sandwich is coming to an end, or is it? I try and keep positive and looking forward, I don’ t look back because that’s in the past … I’ve been there and done that! I can’t keep rehashing where I’ve been and what has happened otherwise, I would be caught in a loop of reliving trauma, feeling crap and in a dark place that I would prefer not to dwell in. Instead, I choose to look forward and live each day as it comes.

Today I went back to see my psychologist as I mentioned the end is coming. When I say that, I am referring to the fact that in a little less than three months the maintenance phase finishes and I have no treatment, no tablets, nothing! I will have blood tests and a bone marrow biopsy every three months. I have dreamt about this moment. The light at the end of the tunnel is right there, but I’m not racing towards it. Instead, I’ve put the brakes on, and I feel like I’m staring at the light, and the little voice is my head is screaming at me saying “Don’t go towards the light!” The past two years my life has revolved around hospitals, doctors, nurses, tests, scans, anxiety, a bucket load of tears and the want to be normal again. Whatever normal is! Now I am so close to what my normal once was and I am filled with fear. I have been actively doing something to kill this bastard and now, I will have nothing. I feel like a sitting duck waiting for someone or something to pull the trigger and for my life to be taken out from underneath me again.

I sat down on the couch in my psychologists room and was waiting for the onslaught of tears, but they didn’t happen. I haven’t been to see her for over 12 months, because I have been enjoying my life and didn’t feel the need to go. However, the closer the end of the shit sandwich approaches the more I feel like I’m slowly going under the water line and I’m drowning. I knew from last time when I was tackling breast cancer, once my medical team told me to go and live my life, instead of being happy I imploded and I struggled, so this time I’m getting on the front foot and being proactive about getting help instead of putting on the mask and making out that I’m fine, when I’m really not.

I feel like I no longer have a purpose. I quit my job, so I could concentrate on me, and I have put setting up my celebrant’s business on the backburner in fear of not being able to do it. I couldn’t live myself if I booked a wedding and then couldn’t do it because I got sick again. There is always a what if! I worry that if I look forward to things and actually allow myself to feel good about it, then it’s all going to be taken away from me and I again get disappointed. This is how my head is now wired; I am always thinking of what bad things could happen instead of allowing myself to let good things happen.

 I can’t keep living like this and allowing fear to stop me from enjoying life again. I need to find the balance of looking after me, allowing me to love myself but at the same time allowing myself to feel all the feels. It’s hard! I feel like I’m on a daily rollercoaster ride …up, down …up down! I’m trying to let the protective big wall I have once again created around me come down a little, but at the same time being ready to tackle the beast if it does decide to reappear.

  Finding a routine again is helping. I have gone back to daily exercise. Again, it’s tough trying to find the balance of working out without working out too much so I pay for it for the next few days. On days when my energy is high, I have to tell myself “No, pace yourself” when all I want to do is smash out 6km on the Terry the treadmill like I used to. Then I have days where getting up, having a shower, and getting dressed is enough. I feel like a lazy arse if I sit on the couch for the majority of the day and do emails and write (this is usually when the mother-in-law turns up. I’m sure she thinks that’s all I do!) but this is my life now. I don’t know what is going to be served up to me each day. I need to be gentle on myself but at the same time I’m angry at my body for not doing what I want it to do and get frustrated. I tell myself all the time that things will get better, you won't always be like this, but on the flip side maybe I will be. Maybe this is my new normal?

Who am I now? I ask myself this question all the time. The person looking back at me in the mirror isn’t the Kate that used to be looking back at me. I have to keep reminding myself that I am more than cancer and I need to switch the brain to this is the new Kate, a different version. I don’t want to be known as Cancer Kate, but that is who I am. By sharing my story I’m putting myself in that position. I long for people to see me and ask, “How are you?” instead of looking at me and asking, “How’s your health?” so I’ve come to the realisation that I am cancer Kate, and this is what I always will be. I know by sharing and speaking up I am bringing light to the subject and helping people try to understand a cancer journey. I am getting the message out there that if you don’t feel right, get checked! I am opening up the door for people to ask the hard questions that no one is game enough to ask. Instead of getting pissed at being identified as cancer Kate I need to embrace it!

I am not the person I once was, my view on many things have changed, I have changed both physically and mentally. I have a lot of days that are rough, and I ask myself why? How did this happen again? But I have a lot of good days where I am grateful to still be here, and I enjoy the little things more than you can imagine. So please know, I am still here in the background. I am still writing, (I’m actually bloody excited about my new book that we are working on), but I am also still a little fragile and at times need space and time to process a lot of things. As I said it’s a rollercoaster. I’m nearing the end of what has been a brutal ride but now begins an entirely different phase that I’m trying to find my way through. I will always have the wise words of Bodyguard Bob “One day at a time” and I my daily mantra of “You choose” ring loudly in my head. I will always have the choice of how I allow myself to tackle an obstacle, and I only need to take one day at a time.

I am sure there are going to be some pretty shitty days in my near future and I’m going to have to work extra hard on harnessing the fear, but I’ve got this. How could I not when I have an amazing tribe cheering me on!

Kate xx

P.S For the record, my psychologist says I'm not nuts! :)