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Newly diagnosed: being brave and fearful at the same time
I think of myself as a strong independent woman capable of solving most issues. When I look in the mirror I see someone who is 20 years younger than I actually am and I feel the same in my soul. The passed 2 years have challenged that view. I'm 2022 I suffered with a bowel obstruction that disabled me for 6 weeks. The doctors at the hospital i was admitted were not competent enough to know to diagnosed or treat my issue and miss managed my care at almost every point of contact. Eventually I had surgery and discovered I had been living with undiagnosed Crohn's disease. It didn't present in the normal way, until the bowel obstruction. I believe the experience traumatized me. It's taken 2 years to work through that and to be honest it still haunts me. I took that diagnosis seriously and I transformed my life to support my body to live in a way to create health. Then nearly 2 years later I'm diagnosed with a rare aggressive form of cancer that has a poor prognosis, Mixed clear cell and serous uterine cancer. That was 9 weeks ago. I'm a fighter, a warrior, a determined person. I find myself moving from we got this. I'm beating this disease to the next day feeling the gravity of my situation. I watch the people around me breakdown in fear and I feel its my job to lift them up. I don't speak openly to them about my own fear. Its to hard to watch them react to me. I do have a therapist who has agreed to be the person I can share my fears with. She said she was honored to be that person for me. I wish I was s tine traveler. I go back and do things differently. I blame myself for not being good to my body. I feel like I did something wrong to cause this all to be happening to me.
This is not who i see myself as being.
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@denisestlouie Your emotional pain comes through in your post. I am honored that you chose to share your story and your fears here. To live with bowel obstruction for so long without relief until surgery and then you finally received the diagnosis of Crohn's disease. From what you've written here I can imagine that you have done everything you've been advised to keep the Crohn's disease managed. And now your recent diagnosis of mixed clear cell and serous uterine cancer. All within a few years is just too much for one person to handle.
I am filled with sadness and compassion for you. I do see that you are resilient. You may have hours or days when you feel like crumbling into a heap of anxiety and sadness but because of your resilience and determination those feelings do not last long. Is that accurate? Your resilience shows up in finding a therapist you can speak with directly and frankly about your fears. I'm thinking that your therapist creates that safe space for you to say and feel whatever comes up without the worry of holding up the person sitting across from you. I do know what you mean here. When I was diagnosed with endometrial cancer one person I worked with said immediately "do you know what caused this?". I wanted to shout (but didn't) "No!! And what difference would that make now?!!". And now whenever I see her she gives me "that look" and I want to cringe when she asks about my health. I do have family and friends who showed up for me then and still do that now. They listen and they do not judge. Have you figured out yet who such people are in your life?
I don't think any of us can claim that we did everything possible to be good to our bodies. Sure, we may have maintained a healthy diet, exercised, refrained from smoking or alcohol, tried to minimize stress. But for every minute of our waking day? I sure didn't do that and yet like you I wondered if I did something wrong. This is my way of saying that I have felt this worry about what "I did wrong" and blamed myself.
I learned a meaning of Hope that is most helpful for me and perhaps for you. Hope is the expectation that something good will happen because you are working with your cancer care team and you have a treatment plan that you are following.
How do you care for yourself when you feel overwhelmed?
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