What Doesn't Kill You...

 Makes You Stronger.... ? Eh...NotSoMuch.  But Different.

I think most survivors go through a phase where it's all like, "not gonna eat this or that, use this or that product....oh, this fights cancer, so need lots of that...."  I know I sure did.  I was a blueberry eatin crazy freak for awhile there.  And I have def incorporated some things into my daily life in an effort to try to keep cancer away.  But I'm just not sure it really even matters as much as I wish it did.  I'm exhausted just thinking about trying to avoid any & all things that have been shown to be linked to some form of cancer.

And I'm sure most of the people in my life are wondering if I'm ever gonna be "back to normal". (Are we tired of reading posts about this topic yet?  Yeah, me too. Sure would love to know how to stop talkin/thinkin/feelin this way.)  And there are some who have expressed to me how I should now be so much better off havin gone through what I did, cause I can now "really live & appreciate life."  Eh....notsomuch.  And I've tried to find the words to explain why not....but I'm just not that great of a writer.  But I did come across a blog post that says it  better than I can.

I'm posting a part of that post, with the author's permission here:
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"I was not perfect before cancer, and I’m sure as hell not perfect now. In some ways cancer has made me worse. I am much less patient and tolerant. And now I have a cancer-focused blog in which I write and share my rants with anyone who’ll read them. I’m sure there are many that would count that as NOT an improvement. Yet, I couldn’t, wouldn’t, have done this without cancer. (Hint: I like my blog and think it’s a good thing.) I documented in my post Punk Rock (Breast) Cancer that I once thought cancer was magic, that I would get this new, wonderful outlook on life and I’d handle things better. I learned that is not true real quick. Cancer just makes a person more who they really are—good, bad, ugly, and/or unable to behave in an appropriate manner while having cancer, or after it.
I often wonder if folks who throw themselves into this “new me” idea and action plan blame themselves for getting cancer in the first place, and hope they are not devastated if cancer returns. I’ve said too many times on this blog that cancer’s motto is “shit happens”, because sometimes illness is out of an individual human’s control.
I recently came into contact with a woman who had just finished treatment and was near tears as she talked about how she was improving her diet and exercise regime to do anything to prevent recurrence. I wondered if thinks she caused her cancer in the first place, since she is doing all these different things now. It was not my place to ask her, and I did not.
You see, I recognize myself in her. Oh, I talk a good game here in my various blog posts about how I refuse to blame myself for my cancer. But I’ve also admitted that I eat tomatoes now because of their cancer-fighting properties. Because in the center of me that is filled with self-doubt, I still somehow believe it was that hatred of tomatoes that put me in that damn infusion chair in 2010-11.
While I cannot judge how any other person “does” cancer, I sometimes think I must seem rather stubborn, or stupid, or both, in comparison to the “change my life” patients, for accepting that maybe I could not have stopped cancer from happening to me."
-From anotheronewiththecancer by Cancer Curmudgeon. 
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Thank you so much CC for that post.  It pretty well explains my feelings on being on the back side of cancer.  Yes, I'm very paranoid about some things...like microwaving in plastic.  Yes I do now try to eat Chia Seeds as often as possible.  But no, I'm not gonna become a vegetarian, never color my hair again or never have another cocktail, or lose my mind because every single morsel of food that enters my mouth is not organic, etc.....

Here's the thing.  I pretty much feel like cancer's gonna do what cancer's gonna do. I know several people who've done everything right & are still fighting fuckin cancer. 


And my six month Oncology appointments are looming ever closer on the calendar & I can tell I'm already becoming a fucking freak about it.  

Anyway, thanks again CC for letting me reblog ya.