Last week I found out a dear friend of mine has breast cancer. Her sibling called me to tell me because she wasn't up for a phone call yet and wanted to talk to me a little bit about it. It was like somebody sucker punched me. I knew that someday somebody I knew or a friend of mine would get this horrible news, that she had breast cancer. I just wasn't prepared for it to be so close to home or so soon after I had just gone through this. Every emotion, every fear, every worry came flooding back. It opens up a wound that is still pretty raw. A wound that is pretty healed over, but cancer is such a deep cut that it takes a long time for it to totally heal and feel strong enough of to withstand any kind of blow. It makes me sick to my stomach that my friend is feeling everything that I felt. I can feel all of it like it was yesterday or like I am still in the middle of it. The uncertainty, the feeling that the process can't move fast enough, the fear that it will spread and grow while you are playing the horrible "waiting game", every unknown that you worry about, everything that makes you want to sit in the corner of your couch and cry and just be sad and scared.
We have exchanged texts over the past week and today we met over tea to talk. She wanted to be flooded with information, knowledge. Knowledge is power. I feel it is just knowing what to expect that can ease some of the fears. That is what I wanted to share with her. I didn't have that. I didn't have anybody that had recently been in my shoes to give me this information. Somedays I felt like I was floundering for something that would tell me what it would be like on the other side. So I told her things that I wish I would have known. I wish I would have been prepared for what my reconstructed breasts were going to look like when I woke up. How horribly swollen they were and how bruised I was, that I have pictures of a few of the recovery stages if she would like to see them. How you won't be able to push yourself up to a seated position in bed with your arms because it hurts so bad. That a chair that reclines a bit with an ottoman was so much more comfortable than my bed. The tingling as the tissue heals and the itching that you can't satisfy because your breasts are numb and you can't feel anything when you touch them. The uncomfortable contraction of the pec muscles as the stretch and heal. The tightness and range of motion you lose in your chest and arms. Be diligent about getting it back. There were so many things I wanted to share with her that I didn't know going into this.
We talked about so much in three hours over tea and could have stayed longer (as it was longer would have been okay since we both already had a parking ticket by the time we left). I just wanted to say something that would totally ease her mind. But, I know from experience there isn't anything that can be said that does that. Until the waiting game is over, the cancer is gone and the recovery has run it's course there isn't anything that can be said that really eases your mind. So all I can do is be there for whatever she needs from me.
After I was diagnosed a friend told me that maybe this happend to me because I was meant to slay the dragons so that I could help somebody one day. I think today I helped her, she needed somebody to talk to that fully understood. It helped me, too. It helped to talk about it and remember all that I have overcome and it is always good for the soul to help and comfort somebody you care about. So I guess I did slay a dragon so that I could one day help somebody slay their own dragon. I still wish I hadn't had to and I so wish she wasn't right now. But, it is what it is and we both move forward in each our forward directions. She has always been such a wonderful friend and was a wonderful friend when I was doing my slaying. But, now we have this connection. A connection that many people can't understand unless you have been there. An understanding of fear, worry and the unknown. Breast cancer makes sisters of two people that wouldn't have had that bond otherwise. I'm blessed to have this friend and I wish her all the strength and peace this world has to offer. Dragons beware and prepare to be slain.
