Goodbye chemo hello wobble

WOWZERS What a few weeks it has been.

My last ‘Chemo Day’

The week after chemo was amazing, I finished my treatment on Thursday 10th April then as soon as I finished my beans on toast (staple after chemo food) me and dad made our way down to brands Hatch in Kent that afternoon, and I spent the weekend supporting Jake, my fiancé racing in the BSB Championship, I could leave cancer behind for a few days. We came home Sunday night and then went straight in to an exciting week ahead, the most exciting part being no blood tests and no chemo WAHOOOOO.

last day of chemo

Supporting Jake ❤️

The next celebration – London Bound

Myself and my friend Emily went to London On the Wednesday. We spent the day being true tourists, did some ‘non’ essential shopping, every girls trip involves some form of retail therapy right? I had my first taste of prosecco since august last year whilst sat in a beautiful spot over looking the tower bridge. I was tipsy from one glass but I can’t tell you how SWEET that celebratory drink tasted. We also got to meet the guys at Trekstock , Sophie, Jemima and serge the dog (another little legend), which was so nice. For you who have been following my fundraising you will know Trekstock is a charity I am supporting, so it meant so much to actually meet them as they are the people behind the great work support young adults in their 20’s and 30’s through and beyond cancer. Sophie is the amazing mind behind it all. We then spent my one week post chemo anniversary working with Cancer Research UK on something really exciting which they are doing.

A celebratory drink with a beautiful view myself and Emily chilling on the day with Cancer Research UKmeeting serge ❤️being tourists in convent garden

To end this great week Me and Jake headed back down south to celebrate our Friends birthday, this was a very special celebration, not just was it her 40th celebrations but also me and Debs had been on a very similar journey both being diagnosed with breast cancer in 2017, we had become friends through a mutual friend of ours and have talked each other through, each step of the way. I had covered a lot of miles, but it was all worth it.

me and Debs ❤️getting dressed up our good friends Danny and Steffy myself and my fiancé jake

The following week

Monday came and I started to feel a little lost in myself. My eyelashes had complete gone and was left with little eyebrows, my hair was starting to grow but I felt myself sat there in a bit of a blur. My joints ached, I felt 30 years older. I was suffering quite bad with chemo rash on my face which was also quite painful. I felt as though my body had just been to battle, and of course, it had, and that made me sad. I wasn’t sat feeling sorry for myself I just felt sad for my body….if that makes sense?

Through chemo you battle on through, you wait for each appointment, bloods, each infusion and you deal with it, because you have to. I felt I had to keep up, it challenged me of course but I did it, and looking back I did as well as I could.

Don’t get me wrong I am completely over joyed with the fact I have finished chemotherapy but if honest I’ve spent a couple weeks scared shitless. I have my operation (lumpectomy) May 11th and then I will wait for the results from that, but the weeks from finishing chemo to now I’ve found things hard. I’m a ‘doer’, I get on and do, but my feelings have left me feeling trapped in my own mind and confused with this because I was ‘doing so well’. There’s everything else too, of course having cancer doesn’t stop the world going round so there are other things that have impacted this feeling and stress too.

I know how to deal with things, I also understand fully its ok not to be ok, So with saying that I just haven’t been ok. I distanced myself from loved ones not because they were not there to support it was simply because I had lost myself and I knew that no opinions would help me until I found myself again.

I came off social media because I needed a break. Through chemo I found myself towards the end spending far too much time on social media, not actually doing anything productive on it either. I also noticed that as I was in a low place comparisons started to creep in, I started to feel like I was so far behind people and I couldn’t keep up. For the first time I missed the old me, the me before cancer, this made me so sad, I am not ashamed to say this either but I had wound up in a place where I had no answers and didn’t even want answers from others either. I guess coming off socials and hiding myself away protected me from putting pressure on myself, I didn’t want to to be told , ‘it will all be ok’ , or ‘just look at the positives’ I felt like I needed time to process my own thoughts and not have anything to cloud those thoughts. I needed to use all that I had learnt to get me through, because I was feeling this, know one else.

Living in extremes can highlight negative emotions even more, so going from having an amazing week before, to feeling the lowest I had so far made things feel even worse I guess.

Lacking confidence in myself

I was meant to be going out with some friends last weekend, I was so excited to get out and be ME but I had a huge confidence crisis. My skin was sore and looked very red and angry, I looked shattered and to top things off I couldn’t for the life of me get my fake eyelashes to stick and as vein as that sounds, it was the icing on the cake. I hadn’t seen some of these friends since before diagnosis and I wanted so badly to just go out and forget what is happening, but I couldn’t, I felt emotionally unstable and didn’t want to be the friend sat there blubbering because someone asked how I was, cause a scene and have all eyes on me. I didn’t either want to be a Debbie downer. I was at that place where I literally couldn’t mask how I felt so I decided to hide away, many would think you ‘need to get out there’ but I wanted to sit by myself and just be. That’s exactly what I did. I broke down and hit rock bottom it was horrible. It wasn’t just about cancer, it was looking back thinking about everything and worrying that nothing will be the same again, this time though I wasn’t looking at it in the positive light I usually do. This breakdown had such an impact that its taken me days to get through it, but gradually I am.

trying to get a ‘face on’ but not succeeding

Dark days don’t last forever

I know dark days don’t last forever, I know that somewhere there is light too, I told myself this everyday. I took total patience with myself and slowly started to see the light, I felt the weight lift day by day.

Now….I feel ok, I can’t lie and say ‘ahhhh I’m fine totally cool’ or say ‘how pathetic of me I should have got a grip’ because all that above needed to happen. I still have a journey ahead, surgery a week today makes me tearful when I think of it, it’s fear that makes me want to cry, and also the realisation of everything that has happened over the past 7-8 months.

I wanted to write this blog because I have shared my story from day one pretty much and this right here is a huge part of this crazy emotional and at some points painfully scary journey I have been on. I also hope that anyone reading who is going though the same can find some comfort in this. Not in my break down….not in the pain but in the knowledge that there is no shame in feeling this way.

The moral to this story is…..well I don’t have one, and you know what? I think sometimes that’s the moral right there.

The ‘Me’ coming back …there is always light ❤️

Love sarah

Xxx