Just Di

When I first found out:
It was a shock. I went through every stage of anger, grief, denial, hated... I dealt with it by myself and it seemed no one understood what was happening. I looked healthy. I was a semi-happy person. I chose to go alone than take someone who seemed to care for me in their own way. I didn't tell my mother for months. I researched everything I could. I never realized how hard it would be. Back then I thought it was no big deal. Who gives a shit, people live til their 80 with cancer.

What hurts the most:
It's a stigma. People wait to see how long it will take. Pity. Not being able to control my tears when I talk about it. The blood work that makes you look like a junky until there are no good veins left. The lack of privacy with your naked body. The way people look past you, not at you when they do a procedure. Spinals with strangers holding your hands. Chemo. Chemo. Chemo.
Waiting for your hair to fall out and hoping it skips you. People having a certain image of Cancer in their mind. The word Cancer. Having to tell anyone I have it, why I go to the doctors so much. Why I look so tired. Why I pass out at Shaw's with 3 bags of hoodsie cups in my hands. Doing dishes and ending up on the floor and not knowing how you got there. A small brain tumor because that's what Chemo can do. Joint pain like you were 90. Waiting til the last minute to take pain killers. Headaches that last for weeks that feel like your brain is exploding in your head. Blurry vision. Forgetting things. Thinking God might be trying to make me feel stupid for being vain about my intelligence. Steroid fat. Having to plan your funeral ahead of time. Signing at direction to pay so no one has to choose your casket or flowers while their dying inside and crying. To know the one you love will die. To knowing I will die. Hoping for 50 more years, but not with Cancer. Having to tell HR and my bosses. Having to tell my friends. Having to tell my family. People asking a billion questions after I just saw the doctor and still haven't computed all the information. The emotional days 24 hours later. Sitting behind the desk at the doctors decorated office while he tells you, you have a disease and he had no clue where it came from. Having them take 2 years to find it. Medicine. Pills, Pills, Pills. Shots, Shots, Shots. Bone marrow extraction. IVs. Having regrets about my past. Memories. Feeling like there so much I want to do.

Dreams... crazy

I want to touch a large elephant. I can't tell you why, but I want to see it up close and feel it's body.

I want to swim with sharks. If I had an extra 2000 I'd get to scuba and feed them on stakes with wearing a special chainmail shark suit. Hey, Mike Rowe did it.

I want ride on my back of a motorcycle without holding on, no helmet with the wind in my HAIR!

I want to relive one of the greatest memories... walking about Tweeter with backstage passes like we were the shit. See these great rockstars upclose, screaming inside but acting like they were just another person when they stood next to me. Dying for an autograph and never have the balls to ask because everyone always did that. Hanging back stage and meeting some really wonderful people. I want to do that again.

I want to ride a horse one last time. I want to see if I can remember all those lessons. I want to brush it and pick it's shoes and and re hay it's barn. Crazy huh?

I want to pick oranges or apples or wild flowers for a farm. I want to touch beautiful flowers and think about what a gift they are from God, how this little seed can make one of the most beautiful things in nature.

I want to not worry about germs, or bone marrow, or spinals, or doctors, or blood tests for just one day.

I guess that's alot of things huh? Dreams are just that, doesn't mean they always come true.
I just want everyone I've ever hurt to realize I was stupid, young and scared shitless of life that I now I wish I could have done some things differently. Back then I was a better talker than listener. I wish I thought how precious those days were and all those good memories are there for me always. And the bad, well I'm sorry. I wish I could take back the pain I've ever caused anyone or anything.

You don't really realize life isn't forever until it hits you in the face. No ones Superman. No one lasts forever. And life is always about just yourself, what you do, what you did, who you were.
Too bad it took me so long to realize just how precious every experience and event that would have seemed so stupid before is just so goddamn beautiful now.