"Permanence" is the word that has been resonating with me over the past couple of months as I’ve contemplated what I want my Cancerversary message to be this year.
The dictionary defines permanence as the state or quality of lasting or remaining unchanged indefinitely.
I like to believe we can always change. I have always been a pie-eyed optimist. But the truth is, some things cannot be changed. Some things are permanent.
This past year has taught me that lesson.
I had no way of knowing that a little more than a month after my 14th year of being cancer-free, I would lose my mother suddenly and unexpectedly. This is my first Cancerversary without my mother. It feels different. It is different.Just as life after cancer is forever changed, so is life once you have no parents. The realization that this is permanent is sometimes difficult to accept.
I always remain grateful that I survived my stage 3 cancer experience because no parent should ever have to bury a child. It is not how things are meant to transpire, yet sometimes, that is how life sadly unfolds.
Early after diagnosis, many cancer survivors, myself included, worry about recurrence. As time passes, this worry lessens, and I’ve tried to share that with people newly facing a cancer diagnosis or treatment. At least now I know my mother will never face the pain of burying me.
My experience with my mortality taught me to be more present in the moment and brought the frailty of life into focus in a way only someone who has faced a life-threatening illness or accident early in life can fully grasp.
I often tell the story of how my mother received a double organ transplant in 2014, giving me nine bonus years I never thought I would get. Now, my Cancerversary and the anniversary of losing my mother are very closely tied together on the calendar. They are both permanent events. I cannot change the fact that I had cancer, and I cannot change the fact that my mother died.
I have had the opportunity to turn my cancer experience into something positive and help others through Ultimate Vitality and Dermavitality.
Now, I have the opportunity to guide others who are losing their parents through the complicated grief process. I am at an age and stage in my life where I am bearing witness to many contemporaries facing the same path I’ve just traveled.
It truly is a gift to be able to help those who come after you through difficult times. There were those who helped me on my cancer journey and my grief journey, and I am always grateful to them. It is my honor to return that favor.
Whatever life throws our way, we always face forks in the road. We have a choice to move forward and try to pull something positive out of adversity, or we can give up, become bitter, or withdraw from life.
I realized during my cancer journey that choosing the latter would be an unfair choice. Some people do not survive their cancer or even get 15 years. Life truly is a gift, and I try to remember that every day.
With my mother’s passing, I realize that spending too much time grieving and not living is similar. She gave me life, and she gave me the spirit and tenacity to face my cancer with bravery and grace. To not use those gifts to their fullest extent would be a disservice not only to myself but also to my mother’s memory.