Possible Irrational Ramblings

I would like to start this particular post off by reiterating that this blog is my space to process my feelings and my thoughts. You see, I'm a verbal processor and, sometimes, it's easier to write some of these struggles here than it is to bend the ear again and again of my family or friends. My poor best friend is usually the one who is the recipient when I find myself overwhelmed with these thoughts. She so patiently listens and lets me vent, cry, and work these thoughts out. Sometimes I want to give her a break and just emotionally dump it out here, so if some of my posts sound like I'm having a pity party or an emotional rambling I ask that you just bear with me or just skip over that particular post.

People often tell me just how strong they see me. That I seem to keep so much together and juggle all of the balls thrown at me. Sometimes I just don't feel strong. Sometimes I feel like an emotional wreck. I feel irrational. All of those balls that I juggle sometimes need to get laid down and I need a break to just...feel....fall apart.... and ponder.

All of that said, my current emotional dump is about two things. 

The first thing is the fear of what my life will look like if the cancer ever decides to make a recurrence. The type of cancer I had does not show itself in any blood markers. It's only found in CT scans that, until this year I had annually. This year was a bi-year so the last time I got an all clear was April 2015. The cancer was slow growing, so the thought is if I was all clear last year, then taking a year off from extra radiation would not be an issue. My surgeon told me last year that he thought I was done with this whole thing and appendix cancer would not bother me again. This is where one may feel that I'm being a bit irrational in a fear that it will raise it's ugly head again. You see, the doctors told me before the cancer diagnosis, that there was no sign of cancer. That I "simply" had a large mass they wanted/needed to remove. When I woke up from the first surgery, I found out the "large mass" was a mucin filled ovary that was 12 inches in diameter and weighed 15lbs (the "normal" size of an ovary is walnut sized).....The mucin? Well that was 3-4 liters of free floating cancer permeating my whole abdominal area. 

While I was dealing with the cancer, I was more fortunate that I ever imagined. The people in the agency I worked with were supportive in ways I I did not anticipate. They loved on me, collected money for grocery store gift cards, donated their own leave so I never went with a single day without pay (even though I missed 4-5 months of work). They were encouraging to me, supportive to me and to my family, checked in regularly with me. When I went back to work on a part-time basis, they looked out for me and made sure I didn't work too hard. The perfect situation to have such a horrible illness. My fear? My fear is that the cancer will rear it's ugly head again. That my health insurance, which has a MUCH higher deductible (a gift of being single and self-employed is I have higher rates than when I had a group policy) will overwhelm my budget. That this practice I have worked so hard to build? That I will have to miss months of work, probably lose clients, not be able to pay my agency expenses that includes my office lease. The list goes on and the worry builds. Pretty irrational when I have no reason to believe the cancer will return, huh? 

Everywhere I turn I hear about someone having a cancer diagnosis. My cousin has been dealing with a couple different types of cancer. I have become friends with a woman who's first husband died from the same type of cancer I had and was diagnosed the same time I was. Another family member has a good friend who was recently diagnosed with appendix cancer as well. My best friend has a co-worker who has been diagnosed with a mucinous disease that we aren't sure if is appendix or colon cancer. And on and on. I will feel I have moved on, then something else will come across my purview and there it is again. On my strong days, I feel confident about my health but there are those other days..... Sigh.... The problem with being in the medical/mental health world is that I kind of know too much about what could happen and what this world looks like. So many people are struggling with a life of fighting cancer. How did I get off so "easy"? Less than a year of my life and I moved on. Maybe I'm waiting on the other shoe to drop? I don't know. 

The other part of my emotional dump is wondering if I will ever get married again. After being married for 17 years, my ex-husband and I mutually separated and nearly eight years later we finalized the end of our marriage by legally divorcing. We were high school sweethearts and he's the only one I've ever been intimately involved with, even though I'm nearly 50 years old. There are many reasons for the divorce, some mine and some his. The part that kind of hurts is that he has dated several people since we split up and yet I have had no one show any interest in me at all. My best friend believes that one day someone will show up and "treat you like you deserve to be treated." I wish I could believe she was right. My marriage ended when he moved out 14 years ago today and no one has ever looked at me since then. The pity party part of me wonders what's wrong with me. I was a good wife. I had my issues and made mistakes. I know I didn't deserve everything that happened in our marriage, but why does he get to have relationships and I don't? (I know. Life's not fair, but seriously? Really?) I see folks so frequently who get divorced or end long term relationships have people jumping at the bit to be with them. Why do I not get to have that? 

One of the reasons I believe guys don't look my way is because my best friend and I are housemates. There have been many people in our lives who assume that we are lesbians and in a relationship. Apparently middle aged women are not allowed to be best friends and housemates unless they are homosexuals (enter serious sarcasm). The fact that she helped me raise my children when my marriage ended, that she walked through the cancer journey with me - staying with me during both hospital stays, taking care of me and my kiddos, that we share a home and expenses, that we enjoy hanging out together, love one another as best friends do, all means that she is my partner. I have been told that I just don't realize I'm a lesbian or that I'm either gay or bisexual and just don't want to admit it for fear of upsetting my parents (my parents, by the way, scoff at this assumption), for the record). This part of my emotional dump actually makes me SO ANGRY. Because I have and had the blessing of a best friend to walk through life with me, to help me navigate the world of being a single mom so I wasn't alone, that I get a label of being a lesbian and don't get to have a relationship with another man again. Because people choose to judge and assume, I live the rest of my life "alone." I just don't understand how and why people feel the need to do that. 

Anyway.....I don't know if any of this makes sense, if you're still reading this dump. Maybe just getting this out here will help me process it all. Or at least get it out of my head so I don't have to sit with it all right now. Who knows? Maybe it will help me deal with some of this stuff in my head.



all contents (c) 2016 Laura Inglis