cAGEd
October is the host of pink survivors marching over gently fallen leaves. Every four years the month throws an “October Surprise” at us. And in 2020, we are facing another deadly Covid Cycle. Insolent October — forever yanking fall back as it tries to recess into tranquility.
At 42 I was diagnosed with Stage 3B breast cancer. I found the lump and, strangely, I mentally tagged it instead of continuing on over the rutted landscape. To this day I wonder how I slid over this particular bump and stopped. My sons were just entering first grade. In the blessings of childhood, what they mostly saw in my cancer was tired and bald. While I looked outward, prioritizing my presentation of keeping it together, feelings and fears were stored below. I certainly wasn’t prepared for Breast Cancer Awareness Month that first October. I was in the midst of chemotherapy and furious at the survivor stories that painted an upbeat side. So inauthentic! Some were even grateful to this rancid beast because now they stopped to smell the roses. The next few Octobers were no better as I resisted the call to action.
The one truth that was inescapable that first October in 2002, was the recognition that in fact, “Health is everything!” Diagnosed at a young age, the cloak of invincibility hadn’t yet left me. Like a jumbled up version of that year, October 2020 gives me a reckoning again on the power of health. With Covid cases rising significantly and the scientific community warning, we have to mind defiance over reason. Reminder note to self — this virus can kill you. The carefree days of summer music in the streets and alfresco dining with friends are now a party of one-for-life, please.
I am abiding by The Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon for my Covid-contagion barometer. The game began in the mid-90’s as proof that because Bacon has worked with so many people, you could tie even the lowest extra back to him in fewer than six links. Substitute “people” with “Covid” and anywhere along the line of connections you can have “infection.” Not sure that so many of my friends are playing along. There are those who in general live riskier lives than I. One friend has been a lifelong traveler who pays little mind to sketchy states. Another isn’t cAGEd because he’s younger, with no medical complications. And when I don’t know someone’s general risk-tolerance, the pause says it all when I mention that eating out together may be a problem. Not going straight to acknowledgement is a sign that they have not lost enough sleep calculating Covid risk in all its various mutations. Yes friend, even outside, because HELLO, you will be sitting a foot away from me, unmasked! Of course limits are always moving, and my selfish hope is that they tighten up their circle so that we can do more together. It isn’t about judging their virus boundaries, as I said in my last cAGEd article (08.31.2020 IG Post). It’s about holding on to our own, while still living a fullness of life. I understand the more liberal thresholds of friends because I too have at times let my Covid absolutes go. It is always a prioritizing, sliding-scale based on our individual five W’s. As usual, October is forcing me to pay attention and rev up vigilance.
October is coming to a close — but still enough time for, The Surprise. The October Surprise is a spectacular bombshell that blows up the course of an election for the front-runner. In 2016, it was Comey announcing on October 28th that he would investigate Clinton’s emails. After four years of Trump-Trauma, this time a surprise would be devastating. A mental health blow for me, but life-threatening for millions of Americans who are already teetering on the edge of losing their homes, not having enough food, lost health insurance, battling with depression, addiction, or Covid, or being people of color or not heterosexual.
Fight, Deal and Help. That is October for me now, along with enjoying fall’s passive sentimentalism. I can handle an entire month of breast cancer reminder because — through no doing of my own — I’ve had years of blessed, complete remission. But it’s also because I’ve worked hard to gain a second-life of learned understanding. I’ve learned more about why I am, who I strive to be, what I can withstand, where I want my future to go, and when it’s time to…(insert here whatever instinct kicks in). The biggest issues I still deal with are being the true me, in the face of a lifetime of achievement conforming to who others wanted me to be; attending to the feelings of thrill or turmoil in values and passions; changing destructive patterns; speaking out from Adult, and risking up.
Talk about it, write it down, share experience and wisdom learned along the way. It works for both givers and receivers. Like the rosy survivors of that first October, I too have marked breast cancer as my defining moment. Octobers no longer smear my favorite season with unresolved damage.
. . . . . cAGEd is a series of stories about the additional isolation and issues women who are over 50 face during Covid.
