Three years ago today, exactly 1 month after my Mums funeral, I got the life changing news I had cancer, not just cancer, but advanced cancer that can't be cured.
Three years on I have (mostly) accepted my diagnosis. I am probably in better overall health, I certainly have less pain, my mental health has improved now my thyroid has gone and I am on the right dose of thyroxine (the hormone replacement I have to take for life), I have the dog I always pestered The Wingman for, I don't have to work, I get to pick Wakey and Pukey up every day (not always a pleasure, it has to be said). In many ways, life is pretty sweet. In the early days, I thought about cancer every waking minute. Â Everything joyous was tainted by it. I remember being in an ice cream parlour on the Isle of Wight watching Wakey and Pukey eat their ice creams, the way only small people can. This huge sob just came from nowhere and I had to walk out of the shop to get my shit together. Waking up was awful, that beautiful halfway house between sleep and awake was shattered every single morning by my mind screaming "YOU'VE GOT CANCER". The Wingman and I devised a coping strategy. Â We have a metaphorical box. Â We put cancer in it and it only comes out when it has to. Most of the time, this works but I would be lying if I didn't say some days are more cancery than others. It would be wrong to never think about it, but getting some perspective and not letting it define every aspect of my life has been key to getting my head round living with incurable cancer and rebuilding myself.
I can only describe a cancerversary as like a birthday, but someone blows out your candles, spits on your cake and shits in your party bag.