Well once again I am writing this while thinking, “is this something I should be writing for the world to see?”
You see, I was raised in times when you were taught that you didn’t say or do things that might upset someone else, you didn’t do things that were not approved of by the rest of the world (or in my house, by the neighbours), and you worked hard not to offend, displease or annoy others.
I’m pretty sure that a lot of my behaviours growing up were based on what others might think of me and my mother was always worried about what they would think of her if we misbehaved or God forbid, embarrass her. By today’s standards, this is almost funny as I truly believe that there are many people who base their behaviour on how they can manage to offend the most people. It might be by their looks, their clothes, their language, their behaviours or all of the above. I’ve heard and read so many times people saying that they don’t care what people think of them. I’m pretty sure that somewhere in the middle of these two attitudes is one that is least painful and most honest to live by. I don’t
understand doing or saying things just for shock value or to upset someone else. So many times I have heard people say, “I don’t care what they think of me”. First of all, if they are doing something for shock value, they do care A LOT what people think. Secondly, why would you offend on purpose just to upset someone else. I’ve always said if I could just have one phrase to live by it would be BE KIND. I think that covers everything. It means we wouldn’t hurt others intentionally, we wouldn’t do selfish things, we wouldn’t try to offend and we would be happier.
So all of that was to explain why I had to decide whether or not to write my thoughts today. They are honest, they are my thoughts but they are disturbing, for me but I hope not for others as they read them.
This thinking came about because of something I heard said on a television show (as you know if you have been reading my stuff, I have watched a lot of television in the last year and a half). I was watching an episode of Blue Bloods. I must mention that whenever I watch this show, I think of my friend Adrienne, who was such a big fan of Tom Selleck. Isn’t it funny how little things can bring a smile just by having good thoughts about people?
Anyway, that’s quite a lot of explanation before I even get to what got me thinking this past week. In the show, New York City had been taken over by fear of a terrorist attack and as I’m sure you all know, Tom Selleck is Frank Regan, the Police Commissioner of New York City. At the end of the episode, in a conversation with the mayor, he said, “That’s the thing about terrorism. It makes us change he way we think and the way we live our lives”.
This was quite an incredible statement for me when I heard it and it’s because it defined exactly how cancer made me feel. It made me feel that my body was under attack by terrorism. If I’m not careful, it will make me feel that way today as well. Let me explain. It’s exactly what happened in this particular television episode. They didn’t know where the terrorists were, they didn’t know for sure whether or not they were even there, they didn’t know when they would attack or even how or where they would attack. This is precisely how cancer made me feel and even after all treatments were done and I should be celebrating. I had all these fears in my head of is it there?, where is it if it’s there?, when can or will it attack, how bad will it be? Now, I have found that this feeling was particularly strong just at the end of my treatments but just as the doctors and therapists told me, I think of it less and less daily.
Instead of thinking about cancer constantly, I am spending more time thinking about living without cancer. I anticipate these thoughts and feelings getting better and better as time goes on. I know definitely that I need to work on this to ensure that it happens. This means that I will work to make these thing happen and then continue to do all the things that promote positivity, living healthy and enjoying life.
