If it's not one thing it's another....

I love that line. It never fails to make me think of Gildna Radner! Rosanne Rosanna Danna was one of my favorite characters! (If you don't know who that is, I envy your youth! now go and  hit u tube!) The thing is healing really isjust like that. It's never just one thing!

At the start of this journey it was the tumor on my tongue causing pain. Then having to take time off from work. (but that's where my identity comes from who will I be now?) Then it was surgery and getting ready for that. By the time I was laying in pre-op, I'd forgotton all about the tumor because now I was about to be sliced open wide enough to have someones hands in my mouth thru my neck. Thru it all there has been prayer. Mine, my friends, there friends, strangers. I found myself prior to surgery giving money to homeless people to hear the "god bless you". (Hey, when it comes to your health never leave any stone unturned! and no, I'n not above buying a prayer here and there).

Then waking up there were themorphine derived  hallucinations. Those took up a lot of time on their own. The feeding tube was a nightmare from the start of recovery. It was sewn into my nose causeing nightmares of being dragged by a large hook in my nose. Then it became my trech always needing suction as my immune system worked to get it out of my body. Then the war of the nurses. The  good nurses hovering not letting me sleep, as if I could.. The bad nurses that I couldn't get to come when called (I know they were busy, but 20 to 30 minutes, really?)

It has  played out this way thru the whole journy of healing. Once my trech and feeding tube were removed the focus turned to my cast. Now it's bugging me, along with the trech removal. It turns out they don't stitch it up, just let it heal on it's own. Now I have a "blow hole". On and on. Never satisfied. There is , of course,  a lesson in all of this for me. If it's not one thing it's another started long before the cancer. Always restless, never satisfied. I was one of the people who believed that they appreciated beauty, but missed it all around me. How amazing the sun feels on the back of your neck after being cooped up too long. Just how cute my dogs are curled up on my legs while I type. The dappled light of the huge but unidentified tree in our front yard. How amazing the body is. I believe from hear on out it's up to me to not only seek out beauty in the moment, but stive to live in the moment..

And yes, I love to bitch and complain at the end of a long day, but reciently it hit me; how amazing would it be to feel peaceful at the end of a long day? The truth is I've always felt unnoticed. I am starting to see that the reality is that I have allowed my focus to be occupied by unnecessary thoughts  to the point that I couldn't have felt noticed had I been on a stage at the Hollywood Bowl.

So what I'm saying here is this. If it's not healing from cancer, it's healing from my own warped self image. And as frightening as this sounds I believe that that warped self image may have led in some spiritual way to the cancer. It's odd, but as this journey began, I felt very strongly that it was bigger than the cancer. I think I have a new motto: Heal Big, Win Big!