Reflection in the mirror

chapter 4

Having cancer sucks. I can tell you that much.

It's more than loosing your hair, eyebrows and eyelashes, having flushes, going through hell and back during chemo, throwing up after every meal, and sometimes before them just for the sheer hell of it, being too tired to go anywhere and when you do, having to retreat to the closest quiet place possible to rest, having sores and weeping ulcers in your mouth so you can't eat anything, even if you do get hungry, spending days, weeks, months, sometimes, YEARS in hospital rooms. 

It's like, you lose yourself. A massive chunk of yourself, your personality, even your DNA.  I don't think it's entirely crazy for me to say that I'm used to the pain of cancer, the deep bone ache, the headaches, the cramps, the flashbacks of millions of needles piercing through my skin, having my port accessed and having scans of my heart and kidneys... the list is almost endless.  but it's more than that stuff. I've practically grown up different.  I remember once, this one time:

I was supposed to be gearing up for a massive surgery at the hospital, though I can't remember what for, maybe it was the BMT or a SCTF ( Stem Cell TransFusion) but I was tidying my bedroom. I know, lamoid, but still, hear me out. While I was putting my notebooks and stuff into my desk drawer,  I found an old photo album. It wasn't one of the ones that your parents make halfheartedly one summer evening, it had like, my whole life in it. Pictures of me with hair, pictures where I'm all bald, pictures of my mother cradling a newborn Olivia in the hospital, shots of my dad and siblings holding me, and then pictures of me holding Cassie. There was one picture though, that stuck out. I'll never forget it.  It's one of me, sitting on the beach with my back facing the ocean, my hair tied into those cute, short bunches that you see on most two and a half year olds but it's the background I like; it's calm, peaceful, an aura of serenity, almost. I like it because I guess I could've done anything. Looking into a not quite three year olds mischievous eyes and happy smile, it makes me wonder what I missed out on. What I'm going to miss out on. 

First dates. I'll never live long enough to have my first boyfriend drive me to the movies, where we will sit as far apart from each other as the seats will allow, he'll put his hand on my arm and I'll giggle and tell him that I loved the night out and thanks for treating me. Then he'll drive us back to my house where we will sit awkwardly in the car, him waiting for me to give him the sign that we should kiss, me wondering how I can let him know that he will be my first.  Then, we'll kiss. Not all slow and romantic like in that movie, "The opposite of sex" but more rushed, like we both want it over before it's really started, and then when it's over we will want to try again. 

Maybe that date goes further. Maybe we'll have sex, maybe we won't.  Let's say, hypothetically of course, that he decides to ask me to marry him when we're twenty six or something. He'll take me out to dinner, ask me to close my eyes, then when he's all ready, down on one knee and the whole restaurant is holding their breath, he'll tell me to open my eyes, then he'll say something corny and I won't remember it, but when he says those magic four words "Will you marry me?" and pulls out a box with a  ring that has our names carved into it, intertwined, forever. Obviously, I'll start crying and say yes, and the whole restaurant will applaud, and then we'll get married, have a couple of kids, settle down, slowly going into the routine of parenthood, stories of work, punctuated by family meals, bath time and stories before bed. I was sort of looking forward to that part of life. Only a little, I mean. Not much. 

I hope I never have to do what my parents have to do. Prepare themselves slowly for the death of a child. I mean, what are the odds of my survival? 60%? Okay, quick mental maths and that means that I have a 6/10 chance of going on to live a cancer- free future with my imaginary family. But. My odds at age three were 90%. at seven they were 70% and gradually those numbers got smaller and smaller until we get to where we are today. 30%. thirty fucking percent.  I have higher odds of dying on the operating table. 

sometimes, I wish I had died at three. Prolonging the inevitable now seems stupid. Pointless.