What now?

Obviously, since I haven't posted in a while, I'm not sure what to do with this blog any more.  I've talked a lot about my cancer experiences, and hopefully shared how faith, family and friends get you through that. I had a whole list of things to discuss on this blog, and you know what? I don't want to talk about cancer anymore!  At least not right now.

I'm tired of cancer.  It's been too big in my life, and now that I'm past all surgeries and all treatment, I want to put cancer in the past, too. I want to go back to being normal again. 

But what is normal?  The tag-line on this blog says "Living After Cancer - the New Normal." Well, that's true, this is a new normal.  Cancer changed everything, whether I want to admit that or not.  But I just don't want it to dominate my entire life.

I'm very proud to be a survivor.  I love to encourage and give hope to others who are struggling with this awful disease or who have friends or family members in the midst of it.  But I've never been one to go to these fundraisers or 5K runs, and wrap a pink feather boa around myself indicating that I'm a survivor.  Please don't get me wrong.  There's nothing wrong about survivors proudly proclaiming that we're still here.  We should!

I just don't want to think about this disease every single day.  It may have changed me...and changed me more than my physical appearance, but it won't define me.  Again, I don't want to trivialize survivorship. Believe me, every day I look in the mirror, I see that I had cancer.  And my scars are a symbol of surviving.  However, my life is much more than “I had cancer.”

I don't want to think about it anymore.  I want other things to dominate my life. Key words: my life. (not my cancer).  That life should be focused on my wonderful husband, fantastic kids, cheering on my daughter as she goes to graduate school, preparing for my son's spring wedding in 2012...there's so much more going on in my life.  Cancer isn't here anymore.  Life is here!

Now I want to be a "normal" woman, whose biggest worry is complaining about her weight!

It’s time for life.

This blog has long been defunct. Probably because I didn't have a topic or theme for the blog. Well, maybe now I do. And it's a difficult one for me to write about. I don't want to be a public person known JUST as a cancer survivor. I'm much more than that. I don't want cancer to become my identity. However, there's so many twist and turns on this journey through cancer, that maybe I should write about it. Maybe just to not feel so alone at times. I know there are many, many other survivors out there who have walked this road. Hey, and thank God there are so many survivors!! I like that! But it's still an exclusive club that we're in. A club we never wanted to join, yet here we are. I've been here twice now. Back on this journey, and I don't want to be alone.
To clarify, I KNOW I'm never alone. As a Christian, I have my faith in God, and He definitely has been with me ALL THE WAY through this journey. No, I don't understand why I got cancer twice. But I do believe that all things are used for God's purpose. Maybe mine is just to reach out with love and with hope. Maybe I'll never know the reason, but I definitely want to focus on moving forward and not back.
This blog was originally called Rebecca's Journey. What a journey this life is! The theme of this blog is the "New Normal." The "new normal" is what happens when your life turns upside down, and this you're supposed to begin again -- with many things being the same, but your perspective, and your physical health and looks being so much different.
Everyone reacts differently to having cancer, to getting through treatment, to surviving cancer. Surviving is a word I like to focus on. However, different we may react, only a fellow cancer survivor knows what this feels like at its core. Friends and family can understand, sympathize, and care for you like never before, but sometimes you want to scream: You don't know what this feels like! But as long as those friends and family members allow you to scream, and still love you anyway, then I guess it's all right.
I've screamed at God. I didn't understand, and I certainly didn't want this. But yet I know He's been there by my side the entire time. Of that, I have no doubt. He's shaping me, molding me into someone else. It's obviously not just my physical body that's being re-shaped. And hopefully, I can take this faith, and this experience, and turn it in to something good.
For now, I just wanted to say hello. Next time, we'll go into my cancer history, so you'll learn more about the road I've been on. Maybe together, we can share and care for each other, and still be grateful to be here!