I've come full circle....

Oct 2006 (5 months before being diagnosed)

June 2007 (2 months after being diagnosed)

Day 15 of my 365 day blog challenge.

Dec 2012 (Cancer free baby)

 

When I look at these pictures now they seem so long ago.  Nathan wasn't even a year old in this picture.  It was such an amazing time for Karen and I.  We tried for so long to have a baby and then Nathan came along.  I didn't know it then while holding my beautiful boy that the cancer in my body had already formed and started to grow.  Just 5 months later, I heard the words that changed my life in an instance "you have breast cancer dear".    When I look at these pictures side by side my heart breaks but at the same time I feel so blessed.

When I look at the picture with Karen and Nathan, I don't even know what I feel.  It all seems so surreal.  I went from having great hair, fit, healthy and happy to no hair, 30lbs overweight, extremely sick and so sad at times.  Soon after losing my hair, I was about to lose both my breasts, my ovaries and every healthy white blood cell in my body.  I had 25 rounds of chemotherapy (this was round 3)!! I lost myself around the time that picture was taken.  I mean honestly, you would have to with all the crap your body was going through.  I mean Chemotherapy..........It is intended to kill both good and bad cells.  There are approximately 25 side effects from it.  Some of them lasting the rest of my life.  Mine today include: nerve damage (throughout my body), nail damage, joint pain, body aches, menopause. 

I never complain and I never have.  I am so thankful for the journey.  Cancer changed me and I've embraced it.  But some days the joint pain is so bad that it's very hard for me to go to work or play with Nathan.  Some times I wish that I could feel my finger tips or that the nerve pains in my legs would just stop.  At times I wish that my mind would settle and that I never heard the word cancer.  But everything that is, has made me stronger and it reminds me everyday that I am a Survivor! I could have died, but I chose to live.......

I am smiling in all 3 pictures before, during and after cancer.  Why? Because I always knew from deep within my soul that at any stage in my life whatever came my way, I would be able to handle it and get through.....I'm proud of myself :)

It means so much to me that you take time out of your day to read, comment and share my blogs.  Giving thanks and sending xoxo