And how to make the two meet in the middle.

I do quite regularly wonder if I am in denial – namely because there is no part of me that does not believe I will be fully cured from this cancer. And I don’t mean that in a forced, relentlessly positive way – I genuinely feel like this most of the time. July/August and parts of Sept and Oct were filled with fears – gut wrenching terror that I would not survive or that if I survived this bout it would reoccur/metastasise soon after. I see nothing other than recovery – the lumps are shrinking, I am clearly responsive to the chemo and by the middle of this year I will have completed my treatment and walk away from this. People all over the world recover from breast cancer – no reason why I should not be one of them as far as I can tell.

I began writing this yesterday morning…then started feeling increasingly unwell so gave up. I was exhausted and dehydrated – I think suffering from low electrolytes but not sure. Weak, tired, shaky – peeing non stop again from Day 2 of chemo – so took a load of ORS, drunk tons and slept. And slept. Safe to say the insomnia is over for now…perhaps the exhaustion is catching up on the last 3 months of no sleep. Or this is the Taxol fatigue people have talked about – lets see: I hope not, as 10 more to go.

And back to the original topic…figuring out what I want and need…focussing from now until the end of treatment give or take. So far I have it very clear that I want and need to be with The Man. 50% of the time is not enough – as I wrote about before, its too harsh for me, too difficult to adjust that massively all the time. I am not aiming for a conventional relationship – white picket fences and all that – but while recovering from cancer I need the stability of having him with me, of being with him. The sadness, loneliness and upset of him leaving (or me leaving) is too much, the need to adjust back into day to day life without him too exhausting.

I am debating jacking in work completely and signing on the dole for a while. No idea yet if that is actually feasible or not but will start looking into it. Right now, I feel like I want a complete break – but I am not sure how I would feel in a month’s time with no job etc…I debated going back into consultancy again – and was actually offered a 2 month consultancy the next day. And it was a huge land to me to realise that I couldn’t do it (after I received the scope of work, not before) as it involved travel to West Africa – I had quite literally completely forgotten that I am so very limited presently. I have used all the very minor savings etc I had moving to the UK and then recently in our house move – so no financial cushion. Nothing new there then ;-).

Work is negative and draining. I am officially back at work today, and my heart sinks. Perhaps had I actually had the 2 week break I needed I may have been different, but I can feel I am very close to snapping and telling people to go fuck themselves. Not a great place to be and will do me no favours. Nonetheless, the sentiment remains…

In all of this, I cannot get a clear read at all of what I want and need. Perhaps too many factors clouding decisions because whatever I decide will have a big impact on money and my relationship amongst other things. I am trying to remove these from my decision making and just focus internally on what I want and need…not easy but necessary.

So – holding the intent out there in the hope clarity will materialise. I am nervous that I will just keep going with the status quo for lack of the ability to make a decision. I don’t mind if I consciously decide to keep things as they are – that is fine – but not just trudging along because its easier than making changes which would in turn make me happier. I am on the train, it is moving pretty slowly presently, but life has taught me it can speed up at any point and once I am on it, I go where it brings me. Opening the door to acknowledging that work is negative, that I am willing to change was me stepping on that train and beginning the change process. What I don’t want to do is jump or fall off it right now and get stuck – I can do anything other than standing still.