By Geetha Paniker, a survivor of triple negative cancer with double mastectomy. A believer of being positive against all odds who pens, all that the mind can reason with the heart. A teacher, turned home maker, she loves reading, writing and handicrafts.
Life after cancer teaches us to look at how we want to live in the future. Some may want to do things they’ve often thought about but never got a chance to do in the rat race of life, perhaps visit places they’ve always dreamed about, or enrich personal relationships with a positive mind. This can be exciting, but we need people to understand us, our psychology to lead a positive life. If you can smile and keep your head high at a traumatic time, then nothing can break you up.
Life after cancer means making some new choices, facing new challenges, valuing your life more, and waking up to the fact that you deserve to do what you love. You discover new things and realize it is a fight for life, through life with grit, determination and perseverance, and that the fight is never over. It is only at the end of your treatment, your journey of real fight starts. You really embark on another leg of your journey. It is adjusting to a lot of changes in your body, a fight with yourself mentally and looking up to squash the new challenges that crop up in your path every now and then.
After your body has been through an enormous assault by the malady of emperors, recovery is a huge thing that depends only on you. You are going to bounce back, though not immediately. You are hit time and again, thrown down, either with a catapult of the after effect of the treatment or new threats from the creeping crab itself, that makes your life worth fighting for, to dare and challenge it, making you feel victorious and not a victim. The treatment may even have cognitive changes of thinking, remembering or processing that affect many aspects of life. Cancer is not a death sentence, it is a journey of life that that 'can' make you a survivor; a survivor who is always a warrior fighting out the challenges the emperor of maladies sends your way to take care of yourself.
Sometimes I feel it is an awakening of your 'self' to take care and keep fighting, whatever it is that you are dealt with. The heart says I am beating for you, love me. The weakening of your muscles, tissues, ligaments and bones tell you to keep yourself fit and happy. Fight for that twinkle in your eyes that threaten to dwindle and dare to keep them alive. A survivor's armour is the nutrition and exercise to keep fit, in spite of all the challenges hurled at you. It reminds you to feed your specific needs of life. Wouldn't it be a shame to weaken after having fought the battle of cancer?
Life after cancer can sometimes be a long and arduous path, with many challenges cropping up to weaken the body and mind. The treatment and the fight sometimes heighten a sense of vulnerability that creates confusion. The effects of the treatment at times don’t stop with the end of treatment, but manifests itself in the journey after the treatment. It is only a ‘never give up’ attitude that can keep your fight alive and your courage to challenge it leads you out of the tunnel of pain. It is always a new learning experience of life to fight life.
"Dare to face every challenge and rise like the Phoenix."
By Geetha Paniker.
Other pieces by Geetha Paniker:
My Love Story with the Creeping Crab
Other Life after Cancer stories
Cancer was just part of my story
