And here we go! This morning, I took my last pill of letrozole. This afternoon, I will see my oncologist, get the prescription for my new medication that will hopefully have fewer side effects and help me feel better, and start a cutting edge monitoring program that detects even a hint of recurrence at the cellular level. (More on that in a later post.) Happily, I will NOT have to get a lupron shot as part of my appointment; I’m done with those, too.
Just before I woke up this morning, I had a dream where I was standing at a podium, talking about what I learned from cancer. I woke up and wrote down as much as I could remember. Cancer taught me:
1.) to give myself grace and give myself a break
2.) I have the right to feel all my feelings
3.) to be tough and more empathetic
4.) I can feel complex, conflicting emotions
5.) to be fearless
6.) how to ask for help and stopped feeling any shame about anything
7.) to let my light shine.
8.) there’s absolutely nothing wrong with loving the crap out of everything.
9.) to go for it, whatever it is.
10.) to tell my friends I love them all the time.
11.) I don’t need to spend time doing anything I don’t want to do. If I can’t do it with my whole heart, then I just don’t do it. If I’m in the midst of something and getting no joy from it, I stop.
12.) stop pushing through just to prove I could. To live, sure. Out of of some made up obligation, nah. The word “should” has left my vocabulary.
13.) to love working out every day.
14.) to take a lot of pride in taking care of my health – my diet, my stress level, my mental, physical, and emotional health. I’m healthier and more whole than I’ve ever been.
15.) to be grateful for all of it.
Thank you to everyone who helped me along this journey. I still have 5 more years of medications, and I’m celebrating this milestone. I’ll take every win I can get. Long may they continue.
Christa Avampato 