…It’s with a lot of happiness that I sit down to write this on the 5th anniversary of my cancer diagnosis! It has been a week of reminiscing, reliving the fears, and celebrating recovery. The time has really flown by and as I sat with a woman yesterday who was experiencing day three after her first chemo treatment, I longed for just the perfect words to let her know she will be OK…
…Indeed, today I am a thriving, enthusiastic breast cancer survivor after 12 cancer-related surgeries including 3 biopsies, 2 lumpectomies, 2 modified radicals, 1 false alarm, and 4 reconstructive surgeries over the last 22 years…
…Flowers smell sweeter, friends are dearer, food tastes so good, I am closer to my God, I am healthy and confident and ready to take on even more world…
…I wrote this piece a year later in a “memoir” class. It is a tiny vignette about my recollection of the chemo haze and the inner turmoil I tried so hard to hide and to deny…
…Ironically, as I sat waiting for over an hour with my dearest friend, in one of Boston’s largest imaging centers, clad in our oversized and unironed “johnnies”, waiting to see the radiologist to tell us everything was fine, I whispered to Joan, “I don’t have time for breast cancer”. And we laughed…
Johnson, Jan... Breast cancer
…The blessing that cancer bestowed on all of us was that we were made painfully aware of the fact that life is short and unpredictable…
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