Cancer as Catalyst

Today I am grateful for a nap and a chance to read a favorite book from my childhood-"Where the Red Fern Grows."

As I continue to reflect on my cancer diagnosis, I am also grateful to be healthy today, grateful my diagnosis was early stage, grateful that I currently have no evidence of disease. Does that mean I am grateful I got cancer? No, it doesn't. Does it mean cancer changed me in many ways, some good, some difficult? Yes, it does.

"Cancer as gift" is often misconstrued and rightfully so. Life-changing, yes. Gift, no. A gift implies it is something I want, something given in thoughtfulness. That is not cancer. I have read blog posts and comments in the blogosphere about this very topic of "cancer as gift" and it certainly evokes a lot of emotion and discussion. Maybe it is just semantics, but cancer and gift don't seem to fit in the same sentence. That said, I don't know anyone who has had cancer who hasn't been changed by that experience. It's how the change unfolds, how life unfolds, that defines cancer's impact on a life.

I prefer to use the term "cancer as catalyst." That descriptor fits what cancer was and is for me.

Before my diagnosis, years of recovery from alcoholism were already shaping me into the person I wanted to be, with healthier, more balanced priorities. So was marriage, motherhood, and marathoning. The writer in me was emerging, but not fully. Cancer served as a catalyst. It brought my priorities front and center-family, friends, faith/recovery, running, writing-and has kept them front and center better than I was able to do pre-cancer.

Cancer and sharing the experience with a close friend and fellow writer also moved my writing to a new level. The long-time poet also became an emerging essayist, and then a blogger. Read about that here.

My life story includes cancer. It has shaped who I am today, literally and figuratively. It is part of my life experience and I can't separate it from the rest of my life experience.

Gift, no. Catalyst, yes. And as a catalyst, it is a powerful one. What I try to do with that is live life fully with my priorities in the right order.

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