Shasta’s heart fainted at these words for he felt he had no strength left. And he writhed inside at what seemed the cruelty and unfairness of the demand. He had not yet learned that if you do one good deed your reward usually is to be set to do another and harder and better one.
~ The Chronicles of Narnia: The Horse and His Boy, by C.S. Lewis
There is a light at the end of the tunnel–and I’m scared.
Last week I had my 3-month cystoscopy to check for recurrence and the condition of the bladder, and it was clear. So I’ve been cancer-free for almost 1.2 years.
I have two more chemo treatments left–one in February, one in March, with a CT scan squeezed in there. It can’t be considered “remission” yet. In May, I get another 3-month exam.
After that…??
After the good results from my last checkup, I didn’t feel as relieved or excited as I expected to be, as I thought I should. I can’t say I felt numb, exactly. There was definitely some astonishment and gratitude in there. Especially because, when I started the current treatment regimen, the nurse thought I would have 18 monthly treatments, but when I asked the doctor last week, he confirmed it would be only 12.
There is so much to be thankful for. I know–and I am.
But after almost 2 1/2 years of some regimented schedule–thinking in batches of 6 weeks or 3 months, sometimes just 30 or even 15 minutes while I’m in the middle of an uncomfortable treatment and trying to distract myself as I wait for it to be over–life is about to get a lot more open-ended. Yes, I will still have regular checkups, even if the cancer stays away forever. But sometime soon, we will maybe, possibly, be able to discuss the future–having kids or taking a new job out of driving distance of the cancer clinic or a summer vacation that doesn’t have to be scheduled around my treatments.
All that should be much happier and more exciting than it is. Part of the problem (my favorite podcast!) is that I’m naturally (or nurturally) an anxious, pessimistic, cynical person. “What if the cancer comes back?” will always be parked in the back of my mind.
Another part is that I will be facing something new, different, unknown. For the past year, I have been slowly crossing a river, one stepping stone at a time, with the opposite shore always in sight.
Now, however, I feel like I am crossing a rickety bridge, over a bottomless chasm, through a fog so thick I can’t see the other side. Faith in the Lord has carried me along in both cases, but I did not expect the latter to require as much–if not more–faith as the former.
As a Christian (and a borderline Calvinist one), I believe God is sovereign and has a purpose for everything in our lives, whether it is good that He gives or evil that He permits. From the moment of my first cancer diagnosis I have been asking, “Why?”
I may never know the full answer. But it does seem like it’s at least partially served as practice for this next stage. The tested faith, the prayers, my husband’s patience and encouragement, the physical discipline of changed habits (though not as disciplined as I could or ought to be), the vulnerability, the absolute necessity and frustration of taking things one day at a time and learning to trust in the Lord, whatever comes–all that might have been a rehearsal for this great unknown ahead of me.
In the midst of all that, I’ve also had a small revelation. An unexpected blessing of the past couple years has been the ability to look back and determine that I did not waste that time. Yes, there have been hours–days–when I spent way too much time on social media or played computer games late into the night or watched a movie with my husband when we should have been studying or exercising. But unlike my college years or my mid-20s or my early-30s, I don’t see the last couple years as entirely lost opportunities or wasted time. And I don’t remember the last time I felt that way.
At the risk of being cliche, I would not wish this experience of cancer on my worst enemy. But there are times, like now, when I come dangerously close to saying the experience was worthwhile.
“In other words,” it continued, “you can’t ride. That’s a drawback. I’ll have to teach you as we go along. If you can’t ride, can you fall?”
“I suppose anyone can fall,” said Shasta.
“I mean can you fall and get up again without crying and mount again and fall again and yet not be afraid of falling?”
~ The Chronicles of Narnia: The Horse and His Boy, by C.S. Lewis
The Badass Introvert 