A MILESTONE…IN ALLOWING THE ONES YOU LOVE TO TOUCH AND LOVE YOU A LITTLE BIT LONGER! MY MOTHER GAINED 3 AND ONE-HALF—ALMOST FOUR YEARS OF CONCIOUS LIFE TO ENJOY AND PRESERVE MEMORIES—FROM THE DIRST STAGE OF A NEW DRUG EXPERIMENTAL AT THAT TIME…NO, I DON’T KNOW WHICH ONE. SHE WAS ABLE TO SEE VIA VIDEO TAPE MY MARRIAGE TO DIANA IN JUNE OF 1989—PASSING ON THE FOLLOWING OCTOBER, 1990.
I’ve been living with Stage IV Metastatic Breast Cancer (MBC) for three (3) years and I confess to an awkward relationship with anniversaries now. Some dates of my treatment and the aftermath are seared into my memory and will never be forgotten. Others, I wish I could forget. All of them create a tsunami of ambivalent feelings. Outside of the anniversaries that deal directly with my diagnosis and treatment, regular celebrations of birthdays or holidays have also become fraught with greater meaning and gravitas.
I’ve wondered at times how best to explain this push/pull of celebration and sadness all mixed together during times that are intended to be all about the upsides of surviving and still being present. It’s been a struggle for me to identify these feelings myself since I’m still not great at that generally. I’ve tried to reflect…
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