My health has become my full-time job, and will be for some time. That's hard. Really, really hard. It exhausts you. It's very taxing on your physical and emotional well-being, your work, your financial state. Your life in general.
When do I get to live again? When do I get to be me again? Even then, what does post-cancer Danielle look like? I know I'm not the same person, but right now, I'm too exhausted to be any kind of person really. Will I ever feel normal again, or maybe, maybe things just become a new normal. A new normal defined by what having or having had cancer looks like. Our lives are very different from the norm.
I'm cancer free today, but the fight is far from over. I still have two more rounds of chemo, followed by six weeks of radiation, a year of hormone therapy and a multitude of check-ups, tests, scans and possibly long-term therapies/treatments for side effects I'm currently experiencing due to surgery, and chemo. Maybe more after radiation and hormone therapy. I have a follow-up thyroid ultrasound in the next week or so (hopefully nothing has changed). I start physical therapy on the 16th for my Axillary Web Syndrome, also known as cording, a side effect developed from having my lymph nodes removed. I will also have a consultation with a Gastroenterologist after chemo. Not to mention, chemo detox will take about 6-8 weeks.
I imagine the next year will still be filled with many ups and downs, good days and bad days, happy days and sad days, and even the really, really sad, depressing days still. Life is truly one day at a time right now. It's measured by conquering one hurdle after the other. No real long-term goals or hopes or dreams. Not yet. I wonder when the day will come when I run out of hurdles though. When I can just live. I guess that's when I'll find what's left of me.
