Just a
couple of weeks earlier I was tired and stressed with day-to-day life. Worried
about money. Worried if I was being a good enough Mum. Juggling motherhood and
after school activities and housework and washing and cooking and a part-time, work-at-home job. Feeling like it was time for me to “do” something career
wise. Wanting to lose weight and “get healthy”.
In an
instant it was like everything just fell away. It was just me and my family.
That’s all that mattered. Every single thing else seemed . . . trivial. And
perhaps it always will be. Perhaps the ultimate silver lining of this whole
journey of mine is to never worry about the small stuff again.
I don’t
know how I got through that first night and morning. I suppose I was on
autopilot. I got up, got the kids breakfast, made school lunches, got everyone
dressed and dropped the older kids at school with a smile, hug and a wave. Mum
had Oliver (my 3-year-old) that day as it was supposed to be a “work” day for
me. Truth is, I crawled under a blanket and tried to sleep.
Just after
midday I got the call. The doctor from the breast clinic telling me that the
biopsies had come back and they were indeed cancer. She suspected I would need
about a year of treatment including chemotherapy and surgery and possibly
radiation.
I got off
the phone with her and called my husband and my parents to tell them the news.
I don’t know what else I did. I think I just sobbed.
My GP’s
practice called to tell me she would see me that afternoon. The doctor from the
breast clinic had obviously called her. So I arranged for the kids to be picked
up from school and Thomas came home and we headed to the doctor.
I could
barely hold it together. Just waves of terror and sobbing.
My GP
explained a bit more. Not all the results were back as they were doing further
hormone testing etc. She had already called the hospital to get me an
appointment there, get me in the system I suppose. That was to be the following
Monday. It was only Wednesday.
One in 8
women get breast cancer. I thought about all the women I know – family,
friends, community and couldn’t help but feel like the sacrificial lamb. Again,
why me? What did I do? My doctor of course couldn’t answer that.
We left my
doctor’s not much wiser but with a bottle of Valium if I needed. The panic was
coming hard and fast and was taking my breath away.