"God, please help mommy's friend not be mad."

When I was diagnosed the second time, I had taken a job in Southern Oregon. It was closer to D's sister who was having a hard time. It looked like fascinating work, and I saw lots of ways I could assist people with developmental disabilities and grow my own skills. I started bleeding heavily three months after I started.

I would do trainings and have to change my tampon every hour. The cramps would start to pulsate, and I would imagine myself floating away from my body, disconnecting my brain from my physical presence to make it through the day. The turning point came when I bled through a night time pad, a towel, a sheet, and a mattress pad in a hotel. I left the cleaning ladies a 20 dollar tip.

Eventually, this bleeding led to my diagnosis with endometrial cancer. My boss and my co-workers took amazing care of me. My work was adjusted, and I was given development work that I could set my own pace at. My friend's little girls would pray for me every night, and Rainbow, the youngest would pray, "God, please help Mommy's friend not be mad." Rainbow, at four, would get mad and sad confused, fairly frequently.

Of all the prayers she could have said, she said the one I needed the most. I was so angry. I was angry at my rotten luck. I was angry at the medication that set me up for a second cancer. I was angry for not stopping treatment and having a baby when I had a chance. I was angry that I couldn't have that "20s" experience. I was angry that I kept having to ask for help and having to pay for medical bills. I was so mad for a little while.

Every time I'd feel that stab of pain that shifted quickly into anger, I'd chant, "God, please help me not be mad. Please help me see this anger as grief." I don't know about God. I'm not an atheist. I'm a cultural Christian. I know in those dark seconds, I called for something beyond me. I needed a strength that I didn't have.

Now, I am struggling again. I am having to leave a job I really do love, and I am having to leave it, because I physically can't do all that my work requires. I know this, and I've made plans. I'm going to be Ducky's nanny for a while. I'm taking the time to be her aunt,  a sister, a daughter, a god mother, and a patient. 

I'm running to something, instead of just leaving something. This helps.

I have experienced both my cancer diagnoses as "little deaths." The me who I would become died on both of those days, and the me who I became was born. The grief I felt on those "little deaths" cannot be explained in words. Looking back though, I feel an odd sense of welcome and accomplishment. The me who I was will never be, but those days are the birthdays of the new me.

This moment is one of those "little deaths." It is a "little death" that I at least knew was coming. The me I was to become is gone. The me I will become is unknown, and this is OK. Right now, I have been holding on so long, buffeted by the wind, that my arms are tired. I am letting go, sailing with the wind, and knowing that all will be well.