Cancer is ugly.

This is ugly.  This whole thing is ugly.  It's exciting for all the wrong reasons.  Its the kind of drama that people feed off of when at a comfortable distance.  I get it but that doesn't mean I'm handling it.  By no means have I dealt with my pain in a healthy manner.  I have no clue how or what to do to make this paralyzing fear go away.  The me that lives deep within has been screaming something primal from the moment this began.  I have yet to silence her.  At times shes sneaks out, short bursts of realness, but I carefully remind her to know her place.  In the beginning, that first week, it was just me and my mom and somehow I was able to cope so well.  I had this glorious ability to ebb and flow.  She gave me permission to breathe, speak gibberish, get mad, throw things, and cry so hard.   Somewhere along the line I lost that.  I went against my bodies natural ability to heal me, I chose to smile instead.  I tried on slap on some happy and cover up the ugly.  Not well, might I add.  I'm not good at it.  I've never been good at pretending everything is okay and I don't want to be.  I'm healthier this way and I'm real.  I am going to cry when I want to cry, get mad when I am mad, I am going to scream when I want to scream!  The freedom to heal my way is liberating, life changing.  Because the truth is, there is no right way to cope.  It's not going to be pretty, these emotions are messy and that gets to be okay.  It's time that I nurture that screaming girl inside me, it's her turn to breathe.

Cancer stole my ordinary everyday.  This monster consumed me, took whopping chucks out of every aspect of my life.  I have so desperately missed my normal.  Although simple, my exquisitely average life has been gone for months.  All I want back is my normal.  My normal is dinner around the table, high-low's of the day, and spilled chocolate milk.  My normal is baking cookies, "Family Activity Jar", and bored games (even when dad complains the whole time).  My normal is homework, baths, and brushing baby teeth.  My normal is laughing with clients, dinner with girlfriends, and putting on too much makeup.  My normal is fighting over video game ratings, chores, and eating enough vegetables.  My normal is tears, hurt feelings, and forgiveness.  Even though cancer took my normal for awhile, even though I am spending every second fighting to get it back, I still acknowledge what cancer has given me.  Cancer gifted me a heightened awareness of just how valuable my time is and just how lucky we are to be alive.  

I will have chemo every Wednesday for year but not all of it will be the kind that makes me sick.  Currently, I have 2 more Red Devil's left.  Whats good about this round is that I only get the Red Devil cocktail on every 3rd chemo.  This means I get a week and a half that I feel almost human.  Its amazing how much energy I have, feeling well has me down right giddy.  Since I know that feeling good will be short lived, I am compelled to pack as much as I can into those 10 days that I am healthy and able.  Knowing that a week from today I wont be me, I'll be too sick to even speak.  So, I have to make sure that I snuggle enough, cook enough, laugh enough, play enough, hug them, clean enough, and kiss them like crazy.  It's probably over the top, but hello?  Have you met me?

Yesterday, I felt so good that I busted out all my fall and Halloween decorations.  I even made a wreath for the front door.  Yeah, that's right, I MADE it.  I stole stuff from all around the house to add some finishing touches and had Zoie helped me glitter up some of our old plain looking pumpkins.  It's good to be back....even if only for a week.