CANCER: You must feel so....

Gentle Readers-

I will readily admit to sort of taking a break from sharing my feelings and thoughts about my current station in life. And, really I think it was in the best interest of all of us that I did so....Here's why-

When I learned that I had in fact been one of the lucky 85% who get cured from this disease from front-line treatment, I heard: "Oh you must feel so relieved." 

Now, duh! Of course I am relieved. Having cancer sucks. Getting cured of it is, well awesome. However, I haven't had that experience, that I think many people associate with news like this. No, I didn't fall down and kiss the ground or reconfirm my religious beliefs in God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Sure, I shed a couple of tears. But honestly....I'm still waiting to exhale. (Sorry Terry M...)

And, I think the reason for the wait is because the emotion that is taking up a lot of space in my world is well, anger with a healthy side of annoyed. And, I'm not talking about that crazy, revenge kind of anger, where I'll head to Nordstrom and buy up the shoe department to make myself feel better. Nope. It's something else. Bigger. 

While I'm sure I would benefit from a tour on my therapist's couch at $200+ an hour, I don't think I'm all that ready to commit to that plan. Especially since I know she's just going to say: "Yvette, the emotions you are having are normal and you just need to stay present." Instead, I want to work on getting down to the roots of this rage. 

And sure, there are plenty of things pissing me off at this present moment- including the little old Orthodox Jewish man at the grocery store who needed to be told not one, not two, but FOUR separate times, how to use his debit card...(Really? Just swipe the damn thing for F*CK's sake.) But, that's really more in alignment with my daily annoyances than my bigger, badder friend- anger....

I think the anger comes from getting cancer in the first f*cking place. I realize that for the past five months, I've been living my life in the "really slow, I might die" lane. And I'm just beginning to figure out how that lane assignment really affected the way I see the world. And even knowing that I'm "cured" from this shit, I still have another 33+ days on my sentence, as I need to finish out this stupid chemo. (But who's counting?)

And, here's the other thing- I feel very guilty for being mad about getting Hodgkin's Lymphoma. Let's be honest, of all the cancers a gal could get, this truly is the best one, right? And, unlike a lot of cancer patients, my experience could be described best as "cancer-lite." So, there's this nutty part of my brain that says: "Look bitch, you really need to get some perspective." It's not like I had stage IV pancreatic cancer, right? But the angry gal inside of me isn't trying to hear that. No. She's not. I'm just pissed that it happened at all. 

So, how I'm feeling? Hmm...that's a Pandora's Box. And, let me just say for the record, in advance, I'm truly sorry if on the day you come across my path, and I'm on a rampage. Really. I'm just trying to stay "in the moment."