Day 21 #pathways2resilience ~ Jan

Special Feature Edition: Pathways to Resilience: Embracing our Vulnerability, Celebrating our Resilience

“That scar will remind me that I survived cancer.............I am happy to be alive, scars and all; my body is different, my mind is different, and the future is not as certain as I once thought it was - but I survived!"

Thank you Jan, for sharing your resilience with us for our month long feature #pathways2resilience

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Breast cancer hit me like an 18 wheeler truck, in the middle of my life, just after the birth of my first grandchild. I was otherwise healthy and happy then it came and knocked me sideways. My reaction to diagnosis was simple, “Right, what do we do now?” and that was my attitude for the rest of my treatment. 

An important moment came the day after my mastectomy, an older lady came into the ward and occupied the bed opposite me, she cried at everything that happened, when the nurse came to measure her for her support socks – she cried, when they came to take her blood pressure – she cried, when someone asked what she wanted to eat the next day…everything led to tears. I tried making conversation, just smiling, anything, but she wasn’t open for any kind of contact. After several bouts of tears and refusing to cooperate with staff, a nurse asked me to try and talk to her because I was so cheerful (I don’t remember being THAT cheerful lol).

I sat on the end of her bed and asked if I could help with anything, she asked me what I’d had done and when. I told her about my surgery and that it was the previous day.  She asked if I’d looked at my scar yet and how I managed to stay so happy when for the rest of my life that scar would remind me I’d had cancer?

Without stopping to think for a second I answered:
“That scar will remind me that I survived cancer”.

Despite some difficult times since then, two more surgeries and the usual side effects of chemotherapy and Tamoxifen, I can honestly say that I am happy to be alive, scars and all; my body is different, my mind is different, and the future is not as certain as I once thought it was - but I survived!

I had this tattoo done after my last surgery...

#panningforgold #pathways2resilience

#bcresiliencecentre #breastcancerawareness