Courage Dear Heart
As the whole world rapidly came unhinged over coronavirus, I acknowledged a bittersweet victory in solitude: my final cancer treatment.
I isolated at home, went to appointments alone, and watched the world descend into chaos like I’ve never witnessed before. But I couldn’t get caught up in the chaos.
Cancer will do that to you.
In October 2019 - smack dab in the middle of Breast Cancer Awareness Month - I was diagnosed with breast cancer.
I guess you could say I have been made fully aware.
Aware of:
lonely waiting rooms,
a never-ending string of appointments,
statistics and data I’d prefer to unlearn,
feeling like I failed somehow,
being unable to focus,
a hyper aversion to cancer awareness observances,
wanting to relate to everyday conversations, but nodding and smiling instead because I can’t, and,
saying I’m fine when I’m anything but.
In the days and weeks that followed, the sentiment that echoed loudly through my new normal sounded like this:
“God will never give you any more than you can handle.”
I’m not sure where this idea came from, but it isn’t true. I will never be able to handle this.
The truth is that God will never carry me through any more than HE can handle. Sounds great. Until you remember that he handled hell.
And believe me there are moments when it feels like I’m being dragged through hell by my ankles, clawing for solid ground. How did I get here? Would all roads have led to cancer anyway? Where did I go wrong?
Other women my age are building their lives, celebrating milestones. I have the oncology center on speed dial.
It’s not supposed to be this way.
Quarantine brought with it a whole new set of stresses. I was still processing the old ones.
Any survivor will tell you the end of treatment is one of the hardest times. Everyone around you moves on, assuming you are done, but you’re never really done. And it’s at the end of a marathon that runners collapse, not at the starting line.
I had come to the other side of the hardest thing I ever faced, and now I faced isolation and I didn’t know for how long. The one thing I needed most - human interaction - was not an option and while I craved freedom and a return to normalcy, I wanted to do it carefully.
Having friends in the medical world, I heard all the first-hand accounts. People barely surviving coronavirus. People who “recovered”, but whose symptoms never really went away. People dying alone.
They were all healthier than me.
Cancer brings with it tremendous feelings of isolation and leaves behind a few parting gifts of its own. I wasn’t looking for more.
About a month into quarantine, someone I knew passed away from breast cancer, her death relegated to footnote status because of a global pandemic. I remember talking and laughing with her. She was just here a minute ago.
It could have been me.
And then there were those whose passing from cancer did not come quietly. One right after the other, only a month apart, they steamrolled over me.
Kelly Preston.
Chadwick Boseman.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
I wept over each one.
I felt bound to their stories, if only because I glimpsed in part what they walked through in full. I had the conversations about it, was surrounded by it on all sides.
Why were they no longer here when they did so much good, and had good still left to do? Survivor’s guilt is a heavy load to bear. “You need to move on,” people say. “There are worse things,” they say.
Dr. David Ryan, Chief of Hematology and Oncology at Massachusetts General Hospital and author of Living With Cancer, summed it up quite well when he said,
“People who’ve had cancer are acutely aware that life could always be taken away from them. You’re always waiting for the other shoe to drop in a way that people who haven’t had cancer can ignore.”
In one swift blow, and then what felt like a million subsequent ones, I found myself in those days utterly scooped out and hollow.
But…
If you and I were having coffee, I would tell you about all the times that God showed up in the middle of my hell. Not tiptoeing timidly through the back, but storming boldly through the front door, keys in hand, like he owned the place.
He cut me loose, gathered me up in his arms, and said, “C’mon, I’ve got this. I’ve got you, too.”
He chased down cancer with the wrath of a warrior, but he knelt beside me with the gentleness of a dad caring for his sick kid.
And I believe he saved me.
He didn’t just sympathize with my story; he lowered himself into my story. I was never alone.
Times when my faith would swell and I would swear to God that I would walk whatever path he laid out in front of me - as if he somehow needed me to get myself together. And times when my anger and confusion rendered me silent and distant - as if that could make him leave.
He is solid ground for me, cancer, coronavirus, and all my contradictions.
There is no quick fix or easy way out. No counting the times I’ve cried myself to sleep. But there is courage for the road I will travel in the midst of the tears.
I don’t remember the last time my faith was dressed in its Sunday best. I’ve needed to dig deep and get my hands dirty.
Real faith is messy. It’s heavy and it’s hard to carry - but so was the cross. It sometimes doesn’t fit or feel good. It’s gone miles without a road sign or a rest stop. But it keeps going.
Real faith fights.
It also recognizes a time for letting go of how you assumed things would be, and instead wringing the good from what is.
Because in the darkest times, when I can’t see in front of me and the bottom keeps falling out beneath me, I call to mind that the object of my faith - what I’m anchored to - is concrete.
He sees the end from the beginning.
He cares for me without interruption.
He clamped shut the jaws of death.
And even when I can’t hang on, he doesn’t loosen his grip.
To my fellow survivors: I know. I get it now. I stand with you. There is much work to be done. Where God has mended me, I will use that strength to serve you any way I can. And now I’m after those who don’t know, to be a voice of warning and prevention to any who will listen.
To ladies everywhere: I know what it’s like to feel your heart shatter to dust. To watch the world move on while you’re left sitting with what’s happened, not knowing how you’ll get through it or what is waiting for you on the other side. To watch fear move in and make itself right at home. If any of this sounds familiar, please reach out to me. Our experiences may be very different, but chances are I can relate to what you’re feeling. Let’s get coffee or get on the phone. I want to hear your story.
To my family and friends: Whether it was a meal, a cup of tea, a prayer, holding space, or just holding me, you showed up in so many wonderful ways, loaning me your pets, your homes, your offices, your cooking skills, your hearts, yourselves. Thank you for being the hands and feet of Jesus. Some of you didn’t even know it.
To my God: Who am I that you would move on my behalf? You were waiting in this place long before I ever arrived, preparing me to walk through it in ways only you could have. Divine crossroads most people will never know about. As shocked as I was, none of this caught you off guard. You are always fully aware because, thankfully, I have your undivided attention. I sensed your hand on this every step of the way.
And just as I was searching for the most radical reset, you shut the whole world down.
Don’t think I didn’t notice.
Thank you for carrying me. Thank you for hearing what my tears say when I don’t have the words. Thank you for handling hell when I could not.
All honor and gratitude for the constant of you when nothing else makes sense.
Job 19:23-25
Oh that my words were recorded, that they were written on a scroll, that they were inscribed with an iron tool on lead or engraved in rock forever! I know that my redeemer lives, and that in the end he will stand on the earth.