Day 1
365 days.
52 weeks.
8,760 hours.
31,536,000 seconds.
That's all the time the doctors prescribed me. Now, I could have less or I could have more.
My body could decide to "beat" cancer for the 3rd time, and leave me full of hope. Or my body could decide to just give up.
As morbid and depressing as it seems I would rather have my body just give up. I've had cancer 3 times in my short life span of 18 years.
Once when I was 2, 15, then now again at 18. I've gone through chemo, radiation, any and every cancer-fighting drug you can think of, and a pointless stem cell transplant.
I wasted a good chunk (2 years) of my teenage life trying to fight it and honestly...
I'm tired.
So when the doctor came with the news of "Your cancer has returned".
I knew I was done for. My parents had hope, but I think my hope got flattened when the doctor gave me my diagnosis.
There's a misconception in the world that when you get told you only have a year of breathing left— you only have exactly 365 days 52 weeks, 8,760 hours and an ungodly amount of seconds of living left.
But that's false.
For all I know I can die within the week, month, or hour. Maybe I can beat the odds and die in 3 to 4 years. There's no due date for when you're going to die.
You just die. Boom, splat, gone. No longer living. Deceased. No longer circulating blood.
I think you get the point.
Is it bad to say, I'm ready to die?
I'm pretty sure if I told my parents this they would have a stroke and my psychiatrist would prescribe me more drugs.
I've lived my entire life fearing that one day my cancer would come back. I've been walking on eggshells since I was two—that feeling of caution and paranoid just increased when I relapsed at 15 and beat it at 17.
We thought it was gone and we were hopeful. Then I coughed up blood and found out I had lung cancer and this was most likely the end. I was offered treatment but my chances of surviving were still low.
I looked at my mom who sat in the passenger seat. She was making weird noises, trying to hold in her sob. She was trying to be strong but with every inhale she did it was a knife to the gut.
My dad on the other hand gripped the steering wheel with an almighty death grip. His knuckles pale, eyes trained hard in the road in front of him.
And I...I was shaking. I couldn't cry for some odd reason.
I don't know if it was a coping mechanism or perhaps my mind knew not to break down in front of my parents. Crying in front of them just made it worse.
Which is why I cried in the shower and held muffled sob sessions under my sheets at 2 am.
Maybe not the best way to deal with my grief but it will do. I'm sure if my therapist heard I did these things she would scold me to hell and back.
I pulled my knees to my chest and stared out the window. The city went past in a slow blur, families walked the sidewalk, clueless to the family that was losing it in the car next to them.
I watched as a mother cradled her infant to her chest while others gathered around, beside them a little girl sat with her two dads.
Families were everywhere and I slowly began to realize I would never be able to have a family of my own.
My dreams were being crushed faster than I could comprehend. Everything I've ever wanted wouldn't be possible.
Babies, jobs, college, a stereotypical Suburban house with my husband, grandchildren retirement—None of that was going to happen.
And I honestly didn't know how to feel about that.
