You’ve heard it before, “Find your new normal.” Meh! What the flipping fudgesicles does that even mean? And what if I actually really liked who I was before? What was wrong with her? Why did I have to give her up?!?
If you’re anything like me, you cruised through treatment. And by “cruise” I mean, your brain was on autopilot taking it one day at a time or else the world would come crashing down. Things hurt. Other things hurt less. And then the world would crash anyway! It was all a blur that kept repeating.
A cruise.
That’s another blog for another time.
I wanna talk about AFTER treatment.
How do you find your new normal like your oncologist so nonchalantly suggested? As if you were looking for your iPhone that had the “Find my iPhone” feature enabled. Ugh! Get outta here!
For many of us young adults newly minted with “no evidence of disease,” we had to pick up the pieces during a transitional life stage. Even a young adult who’s never been diagnosed is having a hard time right now. We’re figuring out the husband/wife situation. We’re thinking, “How many kids do I want in the FAR future? What can I do to get that promotion at work? Should I be buying a house right now? Saving for a wedding? I should probably read more.”
Because of this, the hardest part for me was to reconnect.
Immediately following treatment, I was still trying to answer all of the above, but I was put on a condensed time schedule with a deadline of uh, yesterday.
I’ll explain:
From a biological standpoint, babies needed to happen ASAP if I wanted an inkling of a chance for it to happen naturally. Also, I could never breastfeed said miracle babies (thanks bilateral mastectomy). My boyfriend at the time and I had to discuss family building in a non-traditional manner like IVF/adoption/surrogacy because even if we weren’t sexually active, previous possibilities were now eliminated options that people our age didn’t even have on their radar.
Furthermore, how would we pay for each option? We should probably pick up the pace on that husband tidbit. We’re low on funds… you know, from beating cancer, but better travel now before kids because our life is about to be over in a different way. #Blessed. And yeah, we should also throw thousands of dollars in the furnace on a wedding while we’re at it. That makes sense.
Side note: weddings aren’t for the couples, by the way, if you didn’t know. I just found out. You’re welcome, mom and dad!
Oh, and future baby also needs a house, too. And this all needs to be done within the next two years because that’s when you’re far enough out from chemo to hopefully not impregnate a chemo egg, while also, maybe, not have a recurrence. FYI also, there’s still a chance for recurrence. Don’t forget it’s ideal to finish up baby-making by 40. Or else someone’s turning into a pumpkin. And yes, you should be reading more. You should always be reading more. Okay, ready?
**Lays down and starts another Netflix marathon**
So, you call your friends up. You complain about similar life woes. You ask for advice per usual. However, in every well-meaning bid for connection through relatability, you find that your sense of urgency is tinged with death in a way that their timelines aren’t.
Next, you find yourself struggling to prove that chemo brain IS a thing, and before long, you’re trying to substantiate your worth to people that hopefully already know it. But you fail. Miserably. Because you’re really trying to prove it to the one person that needs persuading — yourself.
I cried. EVERY. SINGLE. DAY.
I felt like a walking reminder of every young person’s mortality. I convinced myself that every inquiry was more of an investigation into how best to avoid getting my obviously contagious cancer, and less of a genuine concern about how I was doing. I mean, I was out on disability and stayed home all day. I never made public my complaints. I was still ALIVE; I should be grateful!
Old me would’ve slapped intermediate me.
In an attempt to become “normal,” I tried to not be so vulnerable about my cancer journey. WORST DECISION EVER. I thought it would facilitate the development of new connections I had AND fortify existing ones. You know, if I wasn’t so different, relationships wouldn’t be so difficult; it wouldn’t be this arduous to connect with others. But I was wrong. Plus, everything’s changed now: my perspective on life, the pecking order of my priorities, and particularly how I connect with others.
Fast forward through many depressive downswings, psychologist-directed CBT modifications, and mindful meditation sessions later, I’ve realized that for me, “new normal” just means “new me.”
I don’t know If I was even that normal to begin with!
The new me refuses to be the shell of an awesome girl I once knew. She refuses to second guess every thought in fear of stepping on someone else’s toes. And she refuses to let life pass by while standing on the sidelines.
Ultimately, I had to learn how to give myself time and grace in order to find my “new normal.”
The “new me.”
Which is still a work in progress, but at least now I finally know what “new normal” means for me.
What does it mean for you?
