This is part one of the Survivorship Series: read part two here and part three here.
Falling off a cliff. Those words stood out to me on the page. Having worked in the oncology industry for many years, I had never viewed the completion of cancer treatment and cancer survivorship as feeling like “falling off a cliff.”
A breast cancer patient wrote the article I read. She had spent the last 10 months in active treatment for her cancer. Now she was finished, and this was the feeling that she had. I mulled over this for a few days then moved on but didn’t forget those words.
Fast forward several months, and I received a diagnosis of triple-negative breast cancer for Christmas of 2015. Lots of emotions go along with that diagnosis but my clinical brain kicked in and I could recite my diagnosis, probability of a cure, side effects from chemotherapy, fine details of the surgery, and exactly how many greys of radiation I would receive.
The calendar was printed, and my husband recorded every single blood draw, blood transfusion, shots, etc. We lived by that calendar, we marked off the days and vowed to never miss an infusion or radiation treatment no matter what. We did it! Nine long months and finally that last day of active treatment arrived. Everyone was very excited and happy except for me.
Those words kept coming to me: “falling off a cliff.”
In the radiation oncology facility where I was treated, patients celebrate their final treatment by ringing a bell. That bell hung in the sub-waiting room that my husband and I sat in five days a week for three weeks.
I confided in him during the final week of treatment that I couldn’t ring that bell. I knew that while I approached my last radiation treatment, I wasn’t “done.” This cancer journey was far from over, I was simply…… falling off a cliff.
While it may sound trite, once you are diagnosed with cancer you are forever changed. Whether treatment is a simple surgery, months of chemo, or a plethora of various treatments, cancer changes you.
But after treatment, you are mysteriously expected to jettison back into the non-cancer treatment world and be who you were before the diagnosis. This isn’t a reality for many cancer patients.
Cancer survivorship isn’t easy; physical and emotional healing takes time. Immersing yourself in your “old world” where no one has changed but you have can be difficult. Struggling to get your groove back and living with the fear of recurrence isn’t uncommon.
I fell off that cliff but with perseverance and patience, I got a little bit of wind under these wings and am learning to fly again.
If you’re a cancer survivor, does this feeling resonate with you, or were there other prevailing feelings? I, alongside professionally-trained CancerAllies also diagnosed with cancer, help cancer patients process their diagnosis and empower them to thrive in cancer survivorship.
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