Making the most of every moment?

How the hell do you live every moment? I sure can’t do it. After I recovered from cancer treatment, I promised myself I would, and there were definitely lots of times when fruit tasted sweeter and the simple act of going for a walk filled my heart with joy, but as time goes by and I feel more confident about the length of my stay here on Earth, I find myself lapsing into the mundane, and I feel guilty about not enjoying each and every single moment to its last.

The more pressure I put on myself to make the most of every minute, the worse I feel when one slips by.  I sleep too late - crap I missed an hour of my life I will never get back.  I watch a Bones marathon on TV – well that’s an afternoon that’s gone forever.  I turn down an invitation to dinner because I am tired and feel like staying home – there go precious memories with friends that will never be made.

So what’s a cancer survivor to do?  I have been enlightened regarding my mortality – I know I won’t live forever and I mean to make the most of my life.  So what does it mean if I find myself here, on a random Thursday afternoon, procrastinating things I should be doing to move my life forward?  What should I do?

Well here’s a crazy idea – I am not going to fight this. I plan to just be my lazy, procrastinating self right now.  I intend to explore my fear that I will end up homeless and alone if I don’t book another facial party, or get another coaching client right this minute. I will ride that feeling as low as it takes me, because you know what?  I am LIVING this moment.  I am breathing, thinking  and choosing my actions, and that is part of life.  And the simple act of living and experiencing this albeit slightly crappy moment to its fullest is already turning my mood, and my moment, around. 

Well, I gotta run! I will talk to you all later.  I have work to do!!

In case you were wondering...

People ask me all the time, “How did you make it through?  The chemo, the surgery, the fear, the pain.  I don’t think I could do it.”

There are lots of tools in our arsenal that help us deal with adversity.  One of my favorites is good old-fashioned humor.  Anyone who knows me personally knows this all too well.  I may cry and bitch a little, but then there is always that joke that gets me through the day.

I lost my ‘other’ job yesterday.  For the past year, while I have been working as The Cancer Coach, I have had another job.  It’s not uncommon that those of us who choose to leave the corporate world to pursue our dreams can’t make the leap in an instant.  There are mortgages, car payments, groceries and yes, our social lives to think of.  So we carve out time in the rest of our days and weeks to follow our passions.  I have wondered for the longest time how I would ever find the courage to walk away from the paycheck, and yesterday, the paycheck walked away from me.  It stung, I will admit that.  As miserable as I have been for the past few years, I worked hard for that company.  I have willingly taken on the tough assignments, the ones that they couldn’t give to co-workers who made more money than I did because I was the only one who could put aside my ego and handle the tough client, the tough conversation.  It was hard to have my favorite executive read me the standard ‘layoff speech’ instead of telling me how much my hard work has meant to the company and how much he wishes it could be different.

But this morning, I woke up laughing.  Today is the first day of the rest of my life, I can sleep as late as I want, and I woke up at 6 am even though I didn’t have to set the alarm.  For the first day in 12 years, I woke up excited and refreshed and ready to take on the world.  I honestly find it funny that it took a bitch-slap from the universe to make me happy.  It’s ironic, yes, but also hilarious. It reminds me of how I used to tell me people that my biggest fear from the cancer was that when I went back to work after medical leave, I might come in to the office, sit down at my desk and take off my top, because that’s what I had been doing everywhere else for the last six months.  Or how I proclaimed only minutes before my surgery that once this was all over, no one was going to touch my boobs again unless they bought me dinner first.

This isn’t one of those ‘if I don’t laugh I will cry’ situations.  It’s my choice to find the humor and the joy here, because that’s how I move forward with life.  Since cancer, I only grieve true losses.  I put this one in the win column - especially since I am now available on a full time basis to help any one of you do the same.

Welcoming Home the Troops

Well, it’s finally happened.  I wasn’t sure it ever would. My boobs have become boobs again. 

I have always had this weird love/hate relationship with my boobs. (Sorry, the word breast sounds too clinical to me.) Anyway, I got mine early, well before most of the girls I knew, and I was both proud of them and embarrassed by them.  Boys in my class picked on me, while at the same time wanted to slow dance me with on the Bar Mitzvah circuit.  (Did I mention that I was also really tall when I was 12?  Most of the guys were about boob-high to me.)  My boobs look great in a bathing suit, but I have NEVER been able to button up a blouse.  It’s really weird to love and be annoyed with something at the same time.

And then one day, I found out that my boobs were trying to kill me.  These things that were supposed to be part of my sexual being, a bit of a nuisance at times sure, but an integral part of my womanhood had challenged me to a duel.  It was either them or me. 

I won.

We both came out of the skirmish a bit battle-scarred.  I lost the feeling in my feet from chemo.   Rightie lost a whole chunk of herself.  That has never bothered me.  A piece of a boob in exchange for life is a fairly easy price to pay.  Other breast cancer survivors have given up a lot more.   But the interest on that payment was a feeling of disconnection from two important parts of my body.  I didn’t have to separate myself from my boobs literally, but emotionally and mentally we were three individuals living in the same skin shell.

But just a few weeks ago, a surprising thing happened. I went to my regular six-month appointment with my oncologist.  Somewhere, during the oh so familiar exam, a thought popped into my head – “this man is touching my boobs!!!”  Now any breast cancer survivor knows that part of the whole experience is experience is getting felt up – ALL THE TIME.  I used to joke that when I went back to work, I would sit down in my cube and take off my shirt.  But suddenly, my boobs and I were one, and none of us were entirely comfortable having some man with whom we weren’t intimately involved poking and prodding.

A lot of people talk about cancer and sexual wellbeing – about how to feel like a whole vital person during and after a cancer experience which messes with your parts, your hormones and your head.  I don’t know entirely what I think about that just yet, but I must be on my way to figuring it out.  After all, my boobs are boobs again.

Living Eyes Wide Open

It’s January 10^th – five years to they day since my cancer surgery, and, according to all the doctors and statistics, today is the BIG day – the breast cancer survival gold medal day.  Today is the day that I have been waiting for, holding my breath, watching it creep ever closer, and suddenly it’s here.  Today is the day that I get to say, “Up yours, Cancer!  I win!”

I always wondered how I would feel when the big day approached.  I thought I would feel triumphant – and I do.  But I also feel sad, grieving for things that have been lost along the way.  I feel anxious, knowing that I have some tests coming up that might prove that I haven’t won. A part of me feels indifferent.  It’s just a day, a Thursday, a date on the calendar that only has the meaning that I give it.

The other day I told my mother that if my purpose in life was to struggle through some things so that other people can learn lessons, then I am ok with that.  It’s the reason I coach, and the reason I blog.  I have learned a lot of things during my cancer experience that I want to share.  Here’s the one I want to share today, January 10, 2013.  The day that I win.

Cancer is not a gift.  I am not grateful that I had cancer.  It sucks.  I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy.  But I am grateful that through this experience I have been struck to my very core with the understanding that someday, I will die.  I am not immortal.  This truth opened my eyes to life in a way that I would never have thought possible, and it changed me. I live differently now.  Do I appreciate every moment to it’s fullest?  No.  I am only human. But I don’t waste a lot of time worrying about the petty dramas of life.  I love my friends and my family more.  I forgive more easily.  I let stuff go. I live life with my eyes open to the truth that I will not always be around.

I am no longer afraid to die.  I used to be terrified of death, but now I fear living an empty and meaningless life far more than I fear dying.  It will happen someday, hopefully a long time from now, hopefully peacefully and painlessly, but until then I plan to keep living my ‘eyes wide open’ life.

Today, in honor of my big day, I would like to ask you to go through your day with your eyes wide open too.  Not to scare you, or to depress you, but hopefully to have you feel the same joy I feel about being alive, without having to face something as scary as cancer. There will come a day when none of us will be here, but until that day comes, let’s try to live ‘eyes wide open’.