Beyond Tired

A question I get asked a lot is,

"How are you feeling?"

My answer?  Great!  Except that I am tired- really, really, super tired.

I don't ever remember feeling this tired in all of my life.

Not when I was pregnant.

Not when I was a new parent existing on a few hours of sleep each night.

Not when I have been sick with a cold or the flu.

Nope.  There is no tired feeling that I can compare to how tired I feel now.

Tired in my bones.

Tired in my muscles.

Tired in my brain.

I have followed a few blogs of people whom I have never met who have experienced similar experiences that I have.  One thing that I have noticed is that they stop blogging when their experience is "complete".  (Probably because they are so tired.)  I put the word "complete" in parenthesis because I feel like the journey with cancer can never be complete.  

It is true that

treatments will eventually end

 and the need for surgery too.

But the toll on your body and mental well being is a different beast altogether. 

So, unfortunately I cannot stop blogging about cancer, as much as I would like to.  I feel like I need to keep sharing this journey as I cross to the other side of the mountain.  I don't know why.  Maybe someone out there whom I have never met is reading my blog and needs someone who can empathize with them.  Mostly I think, I just need to write it down for me.

It's really hard for me to describe how I feel, but I will do my best.

*I feel like I have aged 10-15 years over night.

*My arms and legs are achy all the time, especially during the night and getting out of bed in the morning.  You should see me try to get out of bed or off the couch.  Pretty comical.  

*I used to be a great multi-tasker.  Maybe a little too great because I was keeping myself too busy.  Now, I have a hard time focusing on 1 task.  Sometimes I will just wander around the house because I was in the middle of something and got interrupted and then I can't remember what it is I was doing because I am on to something else.

*I have already commented on my lack of brain functions in another post a little while back.  Well, not much has changed in that area.  Most days my brain just feels a little foggy.  If I don't put an event or something I need to do in my phone or write it on my calendar, it is completely gone...out of my brain.  Again, very strange for me and hard to get used to.  Especially when this lack of brain function makes it so that I forget something that affects other people's lives and schedules.

 *Lots and lots of hot flashes and just a general feeling of discomfort.

Most days I am able to push through all of these things that plague me.  

Most days I just feel so very blessed and lucky that I have a second chance at life, no matter how tired I feel.

But sometimes I don't.

Sometimes I feel so tired of it all that I just shut down- mentally and physically.

These are the days that I hate.  The days when I feel like the cancer is trying to win again even though I really did kick it to the curb.

I am not the only one that experiences days like this, of that I am absolutely sure.

Every one of us at one time or another experiences a "cancer" that robs us of certain things.  When those "cancers" come, we really have 2 choices.

a) we can succumb and let the "cancer" over run our lives or

b) we can fight.

I choose to fight.  

Right now I feel like I am fighting an uphill battle, trudging through quicksand.

But one of the great things that I have learned through all of my life's battles is this...

There is always another side of the mountain.

A side that although has different beauty than before, it's still beautiful in it's own way.

This side of the mountain definitely has different scenery than I expected.

But it still includes these people in my life...

and as long as they are there with me, I don't care what it looks like.