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7 September 2017 (One year later)

I’m a little bit late with this one because I’ve been sitting on it for about a month. For Mum’s one-year anniversary I spent an incredible week amongst friends and family. Recharging my batteries and basking in their love and affection. What a year it’s been. Just like almost four years ago I didn’t see my life taking the turn it did; 12 months ago I couldn’t see through the shattering pain and loss I felt over Mum’s death. I never would have imagined that I could say I found contentment just one short year later. But I have. The earthquakes that seemed to rock my world every five minutes have subsided. Now they’re mostly little tremors and I’ve shored up my foundations so that I can withstand the occasional big shake.

Life has been difficult and I was angry, so very angry, and hurt. Letting it all go to heal has been hard but I feel like I’m finally in a better place. The tide has receded and I’m no longer swamped by every little wave that comes along. I’m thankful for the things I have. I still have a lot. I have a good job with an employer who could see me struggling and gave me time and support to get it together. I have beautiful friends who support and love me even when I can’t do that for myself. I have family who stand with me like rocks, weathering the storms with me even amidst their own. Last, but by no means least, I have a partner who loves and grounds me even when I’m completely irrational and nuts. I write, I sing, I garden, and I spend time with our wonderful pets. I focus on things that enrich me. I now see what is important and everywhere I look I feel rich.

These things all make the inevitable dark days and the pain so much more bearable. Although I still carry the baggage of pain, sorrow and loss with me, I’ve grown. I’ve learned how to carry the weight properly so that it no longer crushes me, but strengthens me without hardening my heart. 12 months on, I don’t want to dwell on what I’ve lost. I remember with love what I had and take a moment to be thankful for a mother who loved me unconditionally, guided and supported me, and who believed unflinchingly (and maybe a little misguidedly) that I could do anything I set my mind to.

Mum, I still miss you with a fire that burns like the sun and I love you to the stars and back. Thank you for being mine. X

Anxiety

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I have a confession to make: I have anxiety. If you know me, this may not come as a surprise; I’m fairly open about it. To others, maybe it is. Most of the time I feel like a fraud. I’ve had people tell me I’m brave. I feel anything but. My manager described me as a strong woman this week. I don’t feel strong. I possess a hyper-critical mind that focuses mainly on perceived flaws. I’m constantly striving for a perfection I’m not sure even exists. I feel like I exist in the center of a war. Missiles, in the form of thoughts, constantly batter me. Most of the time I carry on like it’s not happening, but it takes its toll and it’s hard to maintain. Often, I don’t want to leave the house and sometimes just going to work is all I can manage. When I’m anxious, I’m pretty much at war with myself. Apparently, I’ve elected to play life on hard.

I’ve had an anxiety diagnosis for years. Initially it was agoraphobia, but now it’s GAD (that fun fellow). I’ve probably had anxiety my whole life. I can’t tell you for sure because being anxious is normal for me. It’s also exhausting; being me can be tiring.

They say: write what you know. Well, here are some of the things I know. I know indecision; that guy’s sneaky. ‘But what if?’ he says. ‘What if you missed something?’ ‘What if you’re wrong?’ ‘You’ve been wrong before.’ (I probably will be again) ‘You aren’t perfect, you know.’ (Yes, I do know.) All these things and more ricochet around in my mind. I know hypervigilance. That one’s super exhausting. Like a memory game on crack. Except you try to predict every conceivable future and plan for it. I know fear, shame, lack of confidence and rejection. The list goes on. We’re all good friends.

I overanalyse. Everything. Most of the time. Meditation for me is like trying to herd a bunch of cats. They’re chewing the furniture and climbing the curtains while I’m sitting in the middle of the room trying to achieve calm. Once, I got distracted thinking about how much I think.

Making decisions is also hard because I need to see all sides of the issue. Sometimes they’re all valid. That leads to paralysis. Another facet of anxiety. Sometimes, I can’t do anything for fear of getting it wrong. I have several blog posts, sitting in the wings, waiting to be posted. Not good enough to go. I’ve been avoiding them. I’ve been avoiding a lot of things; including writing regularly. Avoidance: another aspect of anxiety.

Since mum died, anxiety has become a larger factor in my life and I’ll admit: life is not easy. While it is complex, it is also rich. Full of nuances; not just black, white and grey, but a full spectrum of colours. By being kind to myself, listening to my body and accepting the things I cannot change and control, life gets easier. I don’t always get it right but I’m learning to forgive. Others for perceived or real wrongs and myself for not being perfect. While life is hard, (some days it’s much harder than others) it is worthwhile and rewarding. I wouldn’t change a thing and today I practise being thankful for the life I have. I’m thankful for the little pieces that come together (both good and bad) to make me, me, I’m thankful for the things I have and the things I’ve lost. I may not have nailed everything I did today, but I did it anyway.

Hope

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This story starts somewhere in the middle, or perhaps in the aftermath; I’m not sure which. In the beginning I had the best of intentions. I wanted to document my mother’s illness and share our experiences with the world. I thought about it long and hard. I had the best intentions. I thought I could help people by telling our story. I wanted to share our struggles and unconsciously, I think our victory. I had no idea about the journey my family and I were about to go on. In my naivety, I underestimated the toll that cancer would take, not only on Mum’s life, but ours. She paid the ultimate price and we’re left to put our lives back together with a crucial piece missing. I always thought we’d have more time.

So, as mum’s breast cancer was diagnosed and her treatment progressed, I thought and planned and decided to start a blog. I decided to name it ‘A daughter called Hope’. I created an account and, occasionally, I wrote but never published anything. In my naivety, I believed this would be another thing that Mum would conquer. She was amazing, had achieved so much, and burned with a fire that seemed unquenchable. After all, her mother beat breast cancer twice. A double mastectomy, some chemo and radiation and she’d be just like Nan. It was simple. I was wrong. Breast cancer turned into pancreatic cancer and that one’s a killer. It gives no fucks, takes no prisoners and beats just about everyone.

The breast cancer chemo had been hard on mum. It affected her heart and they’d paused treatments while her body recovered. Hopefully enough that she could recommence the chemo. She needed the chemo. It was important she finish as the drugs were specifically targeted to her particular cancer and she didn’t have a good outlook without it. Then, we learn that she has pancreatic cancer and spots on her liver. More surgery follows, this time to see what can be done. The answer: not a lot. The doctors moved her bowel as the pancreatic mass was already blocking her stomach and stopping it from emptying. They couldn’t do much more. They closed her up and planned for more treatments. She made one of the bravest decisions I’ve seen: she opted to stop further treatment. She wasn’t up for more. The nausea, hair loss, peripheral neuropathy, radiation burns and the whole gamut of other side effects from the chemotherapy and radiation were too much. So we planned for palliative care and pain management. They gave her three months; she got six.

She wanted to be at home and she didn’t want to disrupt her daughter’s lives with her illness, so dad became her carer. The devotion and love that man showed still brings me to tears. When things got bad, I took some time off work and went home to help out. When things got worse, I called my sister and she flew home too. Within a week of my sister arriving, the fire that had sustained my mother for 60 years finally went out and she passed away in a palliative care ward of the local hospital. We spent most of that week just being together and loving each other the best we could.

We were with her the whole time and she made every decision about her care. The biggest was to stay in the home she loved with us trying to do what we could to ease her pain, or to go to a hospital where trained professionals could take care of her. Eventually she made the decision to go to the hospital. We stayed with her and did what we could; unable to fully relive the pain, unable to fix things but unwilling to leave her to fight (I can’t bring myself to say die) alone. That helplessness still haunts me.

Although this story doesn’t seem to have the message of hope that I had, so optimistically, decided to pursue two and a half years ago, I’ve found that hope is a very hard thing to kill. Through it all I hoped for many things; some of which I got, others I was denied. But in the end, hope always comes back: a little bit of dawn after the darkest of nights. So, even though things didn’t turn out the way I had hoped, I’m still a daughter and damn it if I don’t still hope.