The Ultimate Wake-up Call
I captured this glorious vision of poppies this morning. Leaving the house to walk our dogs, I felt a call to bring my camera along, and so I obliged. I’ve come to know this tug and have learned not to question it, just to follow it. It certainly hasn’t always been that way. So much has changed for me in this past year.
It is time to share my recent breast cancer experience with the world, as who I am now is informed by this experience. I am a breast cancer survivor since June 2009. It has been and continues to be a transformative experience for me. As I stated in a speech I gave at the Relay for Life event in Warren, MI last month, I share my story with the intention of putting voice to one journey in honor of the thousands that exist which we will never know. What follows is the content of the speech I gave at that event, which is really just the tip of the proverbial iceberg.
First, a little history. I feel I’ve been on a journey to understand this “being human” since I was born. My mother was diagnosed with schizophrenia before I was born. My parents were told not to have another child due to mental and physical medical concerns for my mother, but you know how that goes. At an early age I knew my mother was different, expressing unusual beliefs and extreme emotions from depression to rage, sometimes manifesting in physical abuse to myself or my siblings. Somehow I knew it wasn’t my fault, but I suffered anyway. So I struggled as a child to understand what made my mother different and tried to find ways to ease her suffering and thereby my own.
Fast forward to five years ago when I awoke to my life’s calling. I feel pulled to support my fellow human beings along their life journey toward awakening themselves and living with purpose. This, after 20 years of service to various corporations as a human resource professional and manager. I am now a Career and Life Coach, which gives me the opportunity to not only challenge and support others on their journey, but myself as well.
That said, at the beginning of last year I began down a challenging path on my life journey. By choice, I started a rigorous personal training program, began receiving spiritual direction from not one but two teachers, and I hired a business consultant to assist me in developing a business plan around providing a space or center for people to experience activities in support of personal growth and spiritual unfolding. So, I was doing this work, along side my coaching business work, minding my own business (so to speak) when I received my breast cancer diagnosis in June. Hel-lo! And I thought I was awake before; this was the ultimate wake-up call.
When I was asked to give this survivor speech, I wondered to myself, “What do I have to say as a ‘survivor’?” Relatively speaking, I felt my cancer experience didn’t feel like it qualified me as a survivor. My diagnosis was “Stage 0, ductal carcinoma in-situ and extensive lobular carcinoma in-situ” in my left breast. This means the cancer had not learned how to grow outside of the membrane of the duct or lobe, so there was no risk for it metastasizing at this time. My ductal cancer appeared to me as a spec of lint on my mammogram film. The lobular carcinoma didn’t technically meet the definition of cancer, but pre-cancer. The results of my test for having the known genetic mutation for breast cancer had come back negative. That said, my family history with breast cancer was substantial enough for me and my breast surgeon to stand up and pay due attention.
My breast surgeon sat me down and told me my many options for treatment including various combinations of surgery, radiation and tamoxofin (a form of chemotherapy). I got to wrestle with the multitude of questions, potential side effects and consequences, as every survivor does. Still, I consider myself blessed, twice. Once, with time - time to consider my options, get a second opinion, consult with other health care providers, talk with other breast cancer survivors and weigh it all with the support from my husband, family and friends. Secondly, I was blessed with choice – choice that one of the options I was given was to have nipple-sparing bi-lateral mastectomy with reconstruction, requiring no follow-up radiation or chemotherapy. Just surgery.
Just surgery! This was not an easy decision; it never is. I had been living with the intention of never having to be in the hospital or have surgery, ever. My story around this is that immediately after I was born a month premature I had to have a blood transfusion and was kept in the hospital for a month to ensure my survival; this imbedded in my being a deep fear of pain and hospitals. I also had fears from knowing about other family member battles with breast and an ovarian cancer, including radiation and chemotherapy treatment. As each survivor does, I had to choose what I felt I could fight and win with.
Just surgery. I rationalized, there are worse things I could have to face, such as losing and living without my eyes, my arms or my legs. I was not presently at risk of dying from cancer, so why introduce treatment(s) that had such a risk? Living without my god-given breasts would not have to be a hardship. Of course, I had to acknowledge there was an inherent risk of death from complications with such invasive surgery. So, in the end, it all comes down to this; looking into the face of our own mortality in the mirror, accepting it if we can bare it and then living fully into it. The ultimate wake-up call.
My challenging work on personal development from a young age, since becoming a life coach, but especially since the beginning of last year, was beginning to make some sense. Upon reflection, how fortuitous was it that I’d been getting into the best physical shape I’d been in in years, in preparation for this? How synchronicitous was it that I’d been deeply contemplating such spiritual concepts as human death and dying and spiritual immortality, in preparation for this?
Complications with post-operative nausea and various pain medications caused me to ask for relief by stopping all pain medication my first night of surgery. I came to understand what is meant by “dark night of the soul.” That night I had to face my greatest fears; fear of pain, fear that pain would be so overwhelming it would kill me, fear of death. I practiced mantra, meditation and deep breathing through my pain, and passed through the pain. I came to feel completely safe and gently held in spiritual communion with universal and unconditional love. These are just words, labels, of an experience that cannot really be expressed. I realize now that I have been trying to cultivate the seed of faith in my life, all of my life. My cancer experience nourished that seed, which has grown and blossomed. I am now harvesting the fruits of deep faith and spiritual union in my life. I’m looking toward the end of this year and I see this experience fueling the manifestation of the center for personal growth and spiritual unfolding that I feel called to bring into the world.
As I close, I’d like to share that I believe everyone is a survivor, or at least a warrior, of breast cancer. Either you’ve had it, as one in every four women have battled with it, or you are a man who has battled with it, or you’ve been tested positive for the breast cancer gene and have to battle with a difficult choice for action or no action, or you’ve been a care-giver for someone who has battled with it, or you have witnessed someone’s battle with it, or you’ve championed the cause and battled with it by walking, running and/or fund-raising. And so on.
I want to thank everyone who contributes in any way to support cancer survivors and warriors. I appreciate your “listening” to my story and hope that it provides some understanding and inspiration about battling with and surviving breast cancer. It isn’t something anyone wishes for. It is an ultimate wake-up call that provides an opportunity to awaken and live life on purpose. Don’t wait for the call!
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