I'm still sick. If there's anything like a brutal reality check that I'm not who I was, it's being sick for over three weeks. I can't help but feeling I'm a failure which is a feeling that doesn't make a lot of cognitive sense. How is being ill a failure?
My plans fall apart in mid flight, left, right and centre. I try my best to not let it get me down but it's struggle.
I try to get my thoughts to gel to a point where I can take action to get them done, or at least point myself in that direction. It's such a far cry from where I used to be. I used to get lists of things done effectively every day and get top marks in University etc. I know that is still a huge piece of me even though I am significantly slower now. I need to have my plate less full but my eyes are bigger than my stomach. I still want to tackle things with wild abandon and sometimes I get it done but then I pay the price physically.
I often lament how it feels as if my life before cancer has been severed from me and all I have left is this post cancer life. All the momentum I have built was thrown to the wind.
Or has it?
I received a call a few days ago from a gallery I used to supply with paintings. I have the distinction there as having sold the most amount of paintings of any artist they've ever had. Not bad.
They want me back which feels fantastic. I've agreed and will be working for the next few months getting work ready for them. I also have secured another location completely separate of that to feature my work in March. The work I've been creating for that show is very personal and about my intimate reality of having cancer at 32. I have 2 completely different types of work to get done for two different locations and I need to start ASAP.
I know this is way too much and my body may self combust like it's doing right now but I need this. I can't be cancer girl forever. I need to be able to morph into some other incarnation that is more inclusive of all that I am. I need a dash of hope in this suffering. Actually, I need to leave this suffering behind me.
And what I mean by suffering is collecting up the pieces of me and put them back together. I could make a list of all that is wrong in my life directly because of this horrific infliction but it would be a looooooong list and I'd much rather concentrate on what is right.
3 comments:
Ugh. I'm with you. I'm Stage IV and dealing with active treatment and changing symptoms, but somehow I still feel as though I should be doing it all without asking for help. I alternate between pushing too hard and being a complete slug and shutting myself off from the world.
It's always one step forward and then two steps back. Like you there are days you feel so good and think you can do everything pre cancer....not so because then we land right back where we were the day before. The other weekend we went to the salmon run as I love walking through Goldstream Park (meds are causing severe leg pains)so the next few days consisted of rest.
Monday I am having part 2 of my reconstruction surgery and so I have no choice but to take it easy this weekend,ugh!
I would love to see some of your art work at the gallery when you complete it. Just take it one day at a time. Easier said than done, lol.
Jill.
So exciting that the gallery wants you back! Yay!
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