New year, new me

In addition to all my other new year's resolutions, I have also decided to add, "Me" into the equation.

All the chemo and radiation which I had to take in order to get rid of my cancer obviously causes a lot of issues with the human body.

With all the good also comes the bad.

So, in keeping with my helping others 'mantra' that I have going on, I've also decided to start helping myself.

I've joined a gym and a personal trainer and although I'm only a few weeks in, I already feel more energetic and I expect to start seeing some results in the mirror sooner rather than later.

We all think that we have to accept aging and the inevitable belly and flabby legs but I've decided that this is not good enough for me.

If my body can handle all of the chemicals and radiation, it should also be able to take the pounding on the treadmill and the pushing of the heart-rate to optimum levels.

Our bodies really are temples and we should maybe try and treat them a bit more like the temples that they are.

I have decided to employ running, weights, pilates and yoga to get old 'Bertha' back into shape.

I'll report in each month and let everyone know of my progress.

My wish for you Brianne

Brianne:

This picture was taken of you and Dane about 2 years ago.

You are almost 14 and tonight when I picked you up at the airport I was amazed at how much you'd grown.

You blew me away with your beauty and your assertiveness when you came through the gate and I was at a loss of words for a brief amount of time.

The most beautiful of women and girls are the ones that don't even realize it.

I hugged you and we got your luggage and we brought you home and we unwrapped the presents you missed and then we put you safely to bed and I got to thinking.

I know it had to be incredibly tough to be there when I was going through my cancer stuff. It had to be.

To sit there as a kid and not really know if your mom was gonna be there. WOW.

You helped me with Dane and I don't even know how to actually thank you for what you did to help us all when we were going through the 'thing'.

You have been a rock for me without even realizing it and I have so many things to thank you for.

You are growing into someone that I always hoped you'd become and without much effort at all, you are morphing into this incredible, beautiful lady and I am so, so happy.

We've done the 'period' thing now and we're trying to find a balance between you're wanting a 'leopard print' bra and my wanting you to have a beige one.

We butt heads on you're having a boyfriend and my thinking that you are too young for that and yet, your maturity astounds me.

Did it all happen because your mom was sick and you had to grow up?

For awhile, I felt so bad that you had to grow up so quickly and understand and realize that all things end. I know it was so hard for you.

I thought for the longest time that you would be so screwed up from all of the 'drama' of cancer and you mom having it.

One day, not too long ago, I realized that you embraced it and became a better person because of my disease. You stood up to the plate and hugged your brother and me too and you displayed an inner gift that allowed you to just 'handle it'.

You are turning into someone that I always dreamed and hoped that you would become.

You light up every room that you walk into and I am so, so proud to be your mom and your friend and your mentor.

I want you to see that although all things in this world are bound to end, we should embrace all the good and deal with all the bad.

The glass is always 1/2 full and not 1/2 empty and although I see you looking at life this way, I want you to always experience life this way.

The guy that will steal your heart will be an incredible person to have you in his life as you will be to his life.

You are my sunshine and my 'muse' and I will go to my grave making sure that you are as you are and you are just perfect just as you are.

Never take anything less than you deserve and never stop helping other people and feeling good about yourself.

I know that you love Curt and I want you to experience your mom being totally in love with someone as this is what you need to get a bit older and find your own 'fairy tale' of your very own.

Life can be a fairy tale if you let it.

God willing, I will see you getting married in a beautiful white dress and a bit of an attitude and that's what you'll need to get ahead in life.

I want you to continue in our fostering of animals as I think its important to help save something in the world whether man or beast.

I want you to continue to have the quest of knowledge and I will help you as long as I am able to enable this trait in you.

You make me so proud to be your mom that sometimes I am speechless as you are so beautiful and your personality lights up every room that you walk into and I'm so proud.

You rock sweetie. :)

I love you

Mom

I am anonymous

After the kids are in bed, I blog.

I checked tonight and I have logged over 1000 hours writing stories or drafts or trying to make this story of my life a bit more 'prettier.'

No one in my home has read my blog or even knows of its existence. I write at night with a candle burning in the background and I listen to some 'cafe jazz' and I just write whatever I'm thinking.

I go to work during the day and no one ever sees my scribbling down notes or seeing something that reminds me to write about that tonight or maybe tomorrow night.

I see things now everyday that I want to tell and I want to talk about. I want to feel so great inside at the end of the day, that I feel peace then and a sense of accomplishment.

Thus, the story behind this blog.

It started out as a 'secret' of mine and slowly turned into something I'd never imagined.

I can sit late at night and I can say 'whatever' I like and feel no fear of anyone refuting what I say. My grammar does not ever get questioned and I can end a story at any time that I wish.

The 2 hours a day I spend writing has proved to be one of the 'best' things that I could have ever done.

Very seldom we get the opportunity to sit back and really 'see' what we did and thought 3 years ago in time.

It frees your soul and lifts your spirits and you think a bit more about things that you should have thought about a long time ago but sadly didn't.

It gives you a chance to go back in time and try and fix the wrongs and explain the maybes and embrace the positives.

I often wonder why I don't share my blogging world with the people that are closest to me? I am not shy nor do I shy away from my beliefs or things that I stand behind 100%.

I am 'straight as an arrow' and if I think the sky is blue, the sky is blue to me. And yet, I've gone through some things that I really don't want to share with a whole bunch of people although I do here.

The idea of my cancer coming back scares me to my core. I am strong but I live in fear for at least a few minutes each day. I think its pretty normal to feel that way and if not, I'm screwed....:) hehehe

I will admit that I still wake up in sweats sometimes and I do admit to getting down sometimes when I find out another one of 'us' died today and I wonder why I didn't?

The cycle will never end and thus why I write.

I've read so, so many blogs about people with cancer dying that I wanted to do one about someone actually 'living'.

We all hear about the horrors of cancer and we forget about the greatness of having cancer.

I wouldn't wish it upon anyone that I know but I cannot say really that its been such a bad thing for 'me'.

My heart is way bigger and I think that sometimes I glow with a calm and a bit of maybe, peace that I didn't have before.

I will fight it again if the beast comes back, believe you me.

But for now, I will wait and I will be happy and I will write and others can see that yup, there are survivors and sometimes they are anonymous.

The lemonade stand

2009 is almost upon us and I've finally decided what my new year's resolution is going to be.

My goal is to create a virtual 'lemonade stand' to show others that greatness can come from something so normally bitter. I want them to see.

I am going to respond to the lonesome soul on Craigslist who posts wanting a new friend as he has no one. I am going to extend my olive branch and let him see that there is still good in the world if you only look for it.

I am going to show my kids that adversity does breed character. I will show my kids that its about 'what you give' and not 'what you get.' There is oh, such a difference.

I want my dear sweet boyfriend to see that love is something to be worked on and nurtured and I want to show him that its really magical and full of hugs and kisses and understanding and love.

I want him to put the ring that we picked on my finger with love and I want him to see the love growing from within both of us. I want him to see the gentle soul that I have within that is yearning to come out and feel the sunshine and laugh in the rain and jump in the puddles.

I am going to go to the gym and show myself that bodies can be fixed after they have been broken and they can be better than before. So much better than before.

I am going to pay for the guy's coffee in the drive-thru line up after me. He will never see me or thank me but he will always remember the 2.00 contribution that I spent making MY day and not his. I will do this every-time I want a java fix and a 'me' fix.

I am going to learn how to use my new camera to forever capture what is dear to my heart to show my kids what I am about. I want them to understand me and love me and appreciate all that I value that doesn't have a dollar figure attached to it. I want them to have my memories so they too can see what I see is important.

I want to wake up each morning and do something good for someone else and I want to re-live it again before I go to bed. I want to have that feeling of knowing I did something good today. I want it EVERY day.

I want to take every little bit of knowledge that I've learned about others and about me and I want to embrace that and wrap it around dejected souls that need a lift-up to become better and understand the fragility of life.

I want to help others going through treatment that can't see the end of the road. I want to share with them the meaning of 'hope' and 'perseverance'. Its not just about today. Today is almost over. I want to show them how to embrace tomorrow as tomorrow is what we all have to strive to attain.

I want to feel puppy dog kisses and puppy dog breath from a whole bunch of dogs that are happy to be inside, safe and sound in a caring and nurturing home. I want them to see that not everyone beats them or keeps them outside. I want to see the wagging of tails and the bouncing of bodies and I want to feel them curling up behind my legs when I sleep.

I want to learn all I can about dealing with cancer. If I do this, I can help others going through what I did a few short years ago. If I have lived through it, surely I can help others going through it.

I want to show everyone that life is not about money nor is it about the car that you drive or the clothes that you wear. No one will remember that at the end of the day.

Life is really all about setting up your own virtual 'lemonade stand' and handing it out to everyone you meet.

I embrace my task at hand and I will wear my camo and my lipstick and I will try to hand out 'lemonade' to everyone that I meet.

Life is really a bunch of lemons. The trick to surviving life is knowing that what you see in your hands as lemons might not be really lemons, after all. :)

Cheers and a good-bye to 2008.

"Head down, tail up and get 'er done". (another mantra of mine:)

On the 30th day of the 12th month, I go home.

On the 30th day of the 12th month of each year, I go back to the cancer clinic that saved my life. The day has no significance for me really. Its just another day.

The choice of gear for my 'day' is a pair of camo pants that I have worn to every one of my chemo and radiation treatments in my own personal dance with cancer. Call it my kevlar.

I will get in my car and i'll do the drive-thru of Tim Hortons and i'll order 24 doughnuts (no cake ones please) and I'll secure them in the passenger seat till I get to the parking lot of the clinic.

I'll then tenderly support them till I get in the building and then I'll firstly, head to the chemo wing.

I'll check in the with reception but they are expecting me as they've done so for the last 3 years.

The receptionist with smile at me and take one pack of doughnuts and hide them under her desk like a prize cause she knows how many smiles hide in that plain brown cardboard box.

I walk right into the '411 mess hall' of people doing chemo. People like you and I.

I sit with them offering my fare and I try and show them that yup, you'll get through it. I did. I give them a doughnut full of chocolate and hope that they too can have a future.

I then head to to the radiation wing with the second box of comfort and I realize that I get so much out of putting 8 bucks in.

Sometimes its just as simple as a donut and a smile and good dose on 'been there, done that."

We all walk alone with cancer. We are all on a personal journey with learning abour our disease and how we choose to see and deal with it.

We all take our own path and I've decided that mine will be one full of warmth and puppy dog kisses and camo pants and doughnuts and smiles.

On the 30th, I go home and its going to feel so good to know that it was never really bad in the first place. I just thought it was.

Thank you "ME"

I installed google analytics to keep track of my blog and let me see if what I would write actually made a difference in someone's life.

I am amazed that I have reached out to so many people in my dance with cancer.

I looked back this last week at what I had written years ago when my project started and I sit here in awe.

I have readers from Australia and Russia and the middle east and all over, and I have made contact with 311 people out of the 3140 who were diagnosed with my cancer 2 short years ago.

I started this blog to alleviate my own demons and it turned into something which I never imagined.

I never imagined it to be so positive until I looked back and gave it the reflection it deserved.

It evolved into something that I never expected it to become and it is because of this, that I need to thank everyone who helped or helps me along my road of recovery from the beast called cancer.

I could never say 'thank you' enough for what each and everyone of you have done for me. Words seem inadequate in what I have been given.

Nameless faces have reached out to me when I needed it and I have returned the favor as many times as I could.

Cancer survivors have so many stories to tell you.

They have gone up to the cliff and looked over the edge and they've come back again with stories to tell if you'd only listen to the words and read the lines between.

We skip through the puddles with glee and abandon now. We have to. We might not have tomorrow but we sure have today.

Hugs more freely given and smiles more quickly felt.

My blog has opened a venue for frightened souls to seek comfort and send a cry for help to someone else in need.

What started out as something to help me turns innocently into something to help others and that is really what it is all about.

A time will come when I will die and no longer be around to tell my story.

I hope though from the bottom of my heart, that when my kids get old enough to read about my legacy and what I've always wanted for them to become and what I hoped them to achieve, that they look back at what I've written and they smile and they laugh and they think that yup, cancer freed me to become everything that they should be as well. (without the cancer)

Thank you everyone for alleviating my fears and giving me the power to want to do good by everyone else.

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.