The truth in the smile

I posted this photo from the plane as we returned back from Sydney on Friday. I was smiling; and that was very genuine. I was relieved and thrilled, and a little stunned, to hear the word stable on Wednesday. It was a feeling I could not have imagined before this diagnosis. I regularly share pictures of me smiling because I am generally pretty happy to be alive. I'd like to share a little behind the build up to this most recent smile.

In December I got my usual pre-Christmas bad news. I love Christmas and all the fun, celebration and family time that comes with it. Cancer appears to be pretty determined to challenge this love because, instead of coal in my stocking, which actually seems pretty appealing these days, it gifts me shitty news each pre-Christmas appointment. It started in Christmas 2016 (pre-diagnosis) when I found out my liver wasn't functioning properly. Christmas 2017 it gifted me some new tumours in my newly regrown liver and a very difficult decision on whether to go straight into treatment or to delay it and have an unforgettable life experience. Christmas 2018 it gifted me it's determined resistance to chemo and the news that I no longer had treatment options in New Zealand. That Christmas it also gifted me stress, pneumonia and a real case of the blues. In true form, for Christmas 2019, it gifted me an increase on a previously shrinking tumour.

Actually this was the least offensive of all it's Christmas behaviour so far and for that I am grateful. But it was still shit and I was disappointed and not keen to discuss the scan results. So I stayed very quiet. I put my head down and focussed on the other parts of my life which happened to be decidedly good this summer. I also had writers block. I haven't written anything. And that's because in order to write an honest blog I needed to admit just how stressed I was, and I didn't feel like doing that.

Now if you've seen me since the 10th of December and I've been smiling, that's been real. I've been very much enjoying my life these days. Physically, I feel the best I've felt in years, although my standards are remarkably low for that. I've been enjoying beautiful weather, the fact that I'm at home for it and the ability to get out and enjoy it. I have loads of fun people around me to help distract from the cancer part of life. So I've been feeling pretty good. However, underlying all of that is the stress that comes with rubbish results.

To some, this might have seemed like just a 5mm increase. Don't worry, it's not that big; it's just once; you're strong, it won't happen again. Which is very much the sort of thing I say when I don't want to face it square on. And all of that is very kind and I appreciate the fact that so many people want to find the light in it. The reality for me was that although I was determined to keep fighting, and although I wanted to hope it was just a one off, I also knew the very real possibility that it wasn't. That it could have been the end of my run on what had been a successful treatment. I'm familiar with bad news, more familiar than I am with the good unfortunately. That was the reality I was facing and it was the reality of the unknown. It was the reality of potentially not having another treatment option. I already know that feeling. That was the feeling of Christmas 2018 and it's not a pleasant one. In all honesty, unless you've faced that position yourself I'm not sure there's any way of imagining it and I hope that those around me are not familiar with it. It makes it difficult to explain though. All I can say is that I'm a little nervous or feeling stressed about the scan. To tell you I'm not sure what's going to happen and I don't like the unknown. What was really happening was all those helpless feelings  of running out of treatment options, wondering how long I might live for and how life can carry on if it's bad news in the next scan. Those feelings bundle themselves up tight and lodge themselves in the back of my mind, ready to make unexpected appearances at inconvenient times. Mainly late at night as I try to go to sleep, but also on the scanning table as I attempt to hold my breath in a sterile and emotionless room.

So it's probably no surprise that when my oncologist announced the word stable, even without any measurements, I cried. I cried from happiness, but mainly from pure relief. I physically felt the weight lift from me as I realised this treatment really may still be working for me. That relief of the semi-known, the safety and the hope came out in salty, wet blobs from my eyes. And then, after two days of sleeping, I posted a smiling picture. A genuine smile but one far more complex than it might appear.