Under the mask

Sometimes, I get up in the morning stiff in my joints. Its not from the exercise or the chasing of kids.

Pelvic radiation makes my hips so sore sometimes that they ache without comfort ever coming for days.

I no longer get periods. I believe it was after 7 doses of radiation lasting less than 15 seconds to forever take away my monthly bleeding and my ability to conceive.

It all went so fast in the blink of any eye.

I cannot have intercourse without lubrication. Radiation took care of that. I no longer produce secretions as my glands are all fried.

I must be careful slipping on ice and breaking a hip as I now am 400% more likely to fracture my hips and thus I must be careful.

Radiation increase my chances of getting another cancer in my lifetime by a whole bunch of numbers. Ironic it is that the treatment to cure me also might kill me in the end.

My curly hair went curlier from the chemo drugs that I took. It could have gone one of two way. Lose it or it changes. Thankfully, it was the latter.

I have 4 little 'green' dots on my body to mark perfect center for the radiation beams. I hide them from others as it makes me feel marked.

I shy away from speaking about it as most think you're dying.

I'm not dying. I'm living my life to the fullest. Whatever that may be.

I quit going to meetings full of dread and bad endings and started looking for others who also wanted to live.

I reached out to others with masks much like my own. Others who have gone down a road similar to mine.

We walk as heroes and yet we aren't heroes in the sense of the word.

We are all just masked people who chose to live and are given a second chance at living.

We can't talk to others in groups cause they are filled with the dying looking for help at the end.

We are cured of our cancers and we help others who are not beating the great fight with the beast and then we are sad.

We think of the ending and yet we haven't heard yet that 'it' has come back.

We live in fear of the unknown and we second-guess everything.

We also need healing from the mark cancer left.

One cannot see but it is there and I feel it.

It is under my mask which I present to the world.

I keep the after-affects close to my heart as they always remind me that I survived this disease for another day.

The symptoms tell me that I did it, I lived it and I lived through it and strangely they provide comfort as I walk with my kids today and hopefully, for tomorrow.

Nothing is free and a price is always to be paid and yet, I still hide under my mask.