Blogging for a better life

Let’s talk sensory overload. What is it? Why? And, can it please just stop already! There’s ringing in both ears, the visuals and sounds of the television are too much. You’re tired; but you’re not sleepy. Wait, your exhausted from being days on end fatigued. God knows why your fatigued. Two years and ten months post chemo and just brewing coffee makes you want to crawl back in bed and go to sleep as if it were night.

Taking a shower feels like an eight our shift. First you think about it. Then you just get exhausted thinking about it, because you’re traumatized about every little facet and step it takes for something that’s supposed to make you feel like self care is bliss. So, it’s back to sleep you go!

You wake up from a nap and realize that you need to work on what rehabs been working on with you for years: chunking, planning, every little win is a win. Despite your fatigued l, you brushed your hair today that’s now grown back! Yay! Let’s celebrate! Middle-age and you feel like this is so elementary. That’s until your brain reminds you you had chemo two years ago and cancer and chemo together deconstructed your entire being from the inside out and you truly do need to re-learn and maybe now’s the time to stay unlearned about some things in your life that weren’t serving you purpose the first half of your life.

Chemo/cancer; it’s such an oxy moron, because while it’s the demon in your life, it’s also the thing that’s saved your life while fighting through the journey. And the duration of life is whatever context you’ve defined it to be. It’s most definitely not what the person next to you’s definition is, because they’ve walked a different path than you. Maybe it’s been easier, or maybe it’s been harder. Every journey is someone’s journey, and it just maybe not yours. Everyone’s journey was curated specifically for that individual and they choose the roadmaps they use. They dictate how fast or slow they go. They make the decision if they’re going to enjoy the journey no matter how dark it gets.

I have some questions for my readers and encourage you to inbox me whether it’s through this site or you follow me on social media. In your life thus far, what has been your most debilitating journey you’ve traveled this far and how has it molded you? How did you feel? Did you come out stronger and brighter? Are you going through that fight now? Were you and are you able to pause and listen quietly? Could you sit with yourself quietly for two years, and what kinds of things would you discover about yourself and the world?

…2-years and 10-months post-chemo, and if I were told to name only the top two of my most challenging lessons in my cancer journey, those lessons would be “pacing” and being okay with sitting still. I never would have fathomed my life looking the way it currently does, let alone dreamed I would ever be the one on the cancer journey. We grow in life feeling invincible and live life carefree, until one day we are forced to hear that one word, “cancer.” While chemo brain still has me facing challenges with short-term memory, my long-term memory seems as if it was just yesterday.