I'm alive.

Yes, 'tis I.  Who has not written anything for myself since October.  For 6 months!

I don't know why I don't feel like writing.  Well no..... that's bull shit.  Sometimes, I feel whiny and I don't want to irritate people.  Sometimes it freaks me out for people to know that I AM NOT OKAY.  Because I try so hard to be okay.  To keep my feet moving.  But the reality is.  I am not always okay.

Something happened to me after my reconstruction (which was in February).  Something I can't explain.  It's like the reality of cancer finally has hit me.  Sometimes I cry for hours for no reason whatsoever.  In the middle of the day, suddenly I just ....can't....anymore.  I'm tired.   So tired.

I was expecting my surgery to me this amazing crescendo to my cancer journey.  This amazing body altering "ahhhhhh" end to the shit.  And it just wasn't.....isn't....

Surgery went fine.  Nothing bad happened. But nothing great happened either.  Don't get me wrong my body looks fucking amazing.  But, my body perception issues got worse, not better.  My mental health got worse, not better.  I feel like I need constant reassurance.  I have no idea what I really want.

I sincerely thought that this year of cancer crap was going to be a little blip on the radar of my life.  I would get through the 365 days of treatment and be done.  The cancer cannot come back, I will not be dying.  Just limp through the year and it's over.  Riiiiiiiight.   Treatment is over an now I'm being buried by the tons of baggage I've been carrying around because I've been too busy being a medical guinea pig to deal with it.

In an attempt to maintain my little disillusion, I have completely separated myself from the other patients at the cancer center.  I don't talk to anyone.  Ever.  I have been having infusions every 3 weeks for a year and didn't talk to people.  I sit with my little headphones in, watching TV on my laptop, being super friendly to the nurses, but ignoring the other patients.  Yep, I'm that bitch.

I know why.  It's because I couldn't handle it.  They might die.  Any freaking day.  And they remind me of the reality of cancer.  And they say things that I just can't hear.

 They say things like, "This is chronic. What we have is chronic."  This from a woman who has been on chemo for 9 YEARS.  When her cancer stops responding to one type of chemo, they switch to another.  She is dying. Period.

Or "That's what I said too the first time around.  This is the third time I have done chemo and my hair....blah....blah"  Honestly I can't remember what else she said.  I tuned out at "third time."

Or there is that lady they took to the ER last week.....

But my ostracized state is about to come to an end.  As you know cancer has taught me to get out there and do stuff even if it scares the shit out of me.  I recently applied to go on a First Descents trip this summer and just have to chose my dates. I am going kayaking with 13 or so other cancer patients/survivors.  I'm terrified of the kayaking (the first thing you have to do is learn to roll the thing....IN WATER.  You're legs are strapped into that shit!  I can't swim! ah!).  But a realization has come upon me.  There will roughly be a dozen or so of us.......at least one of us is going to die.  Somebody is going to lose.  I don't think I can handle getting to know someone who is going to die.  I can't lose someone.  I DO NOT want to get close to someone over this amazing week of freaked out bonding, just to have them drop dead.

It's all too much.