The moving truck is packed from floor to ceiling and front to back, leaving only enough space for my thoughts to weave in and out as I grapple with the uncertainty of this decision.
The looming potential diagnosis suddenly at the precipice of every thought, ready to take hold of my life. Am I really about to move across the country to a city where I have no family, no community, as I’m being diagnosed with cancer? And if this is my new reality, how do I even begin to prepare for how to manage this?
I take a step back, surveying the moving truck, the empty house, then back to the truck – a bittersweet ache in my chest. Boxes labeled “books”, “girl’s room”, and “fragile” jostle against each other, their contents a chaotic mix of four lives lived across two states and eight cities, both memories and necessities. This is the move we’ve been so excited about for so long, and I’m about to leave my entire family at a time when I will need them the most.
The excitement rushes away from my chest. Like the sentinel lymph nodes that drain a tumor, cancer drains the very essence of life. I’m no longer excited. I’m terrified and uncertain.
It’s evening and as the sun dips low on the horizon I close my eyes for a moment, grateful for what the last two and half years in North Carolina have provided – a closeness with my family, bottomless mimosas and drag shows with my sisters, many Sunday brunch’s with my parents, the ability to be there for my dad who’s been living with cancer for 16 years, cuppa after cuppa with my mom. The house is quiet, hollow and empty, but I can hear the neighborhood kids running and laughing. I’m struck again by the magnitude of all we’re leaving behind.
My village
With a deep breath, I climb into the passenger’s seat of the moving truck. As we begin to drive, I hold back the tears of uncertainty, wondering whether I’m running toward something new or away from the fear that has suddenly consumed me like a noisy fog. What if this move is a mistake? I’ve seen what cancer can do to people, to my dad, and I’ve seen the village of support that lifts people up during that time. I’m leaving my village, and I have no idea how I’ll survive.
As the miles start to pass, I try to remind myself that I’m not alone. I think about our first stop and call my “Aunt” Mary in Atlanta to ask if we can stay with her for the night. My mom and Mary have been best friends since middle school and her family has always felt more like our own. The request is really just a formality; I know she’ll say “ Of course, baby!” Mary is in the middle of her own battle against breast cancer and when I left the radiologist’s office a couple of days earlier, she was the first person I called. I needed to talk with someone who had heard these words before, who had felt what I felt. I needed to know how the hell I was going to deal with this. But most of all, I needed someone who would give me straight-up – no bull shit answers. Mary delivers on the no bullshit every time.
When we arrived at her house a little after midnight, she rushed down the stairs to answer the door after hearing the dogs barking. In true Mary fashion, she hadn’t told her husband we were coming so he’s yelling “Who is it?!”
A few weeks earlier my mom and sisters and I flew down to Atlanta to spend a girl’s weekend with Mary. It was a joyful weekend, filled with food, laughter, and conversations about the wonders and challenges of relationships, the beauty and darkness of the world, and, of course, breast cancer. Mary showed us her scars, talked about the side effects of chemo, her hair beginning to fall out, and the looming possibility of lymphedema. Despite the turmoil cancer causes, it was a healing weekend – one that, at the time, I didn’t even realize I needed. Mary has a way of handling life without much worry and always with a wonderful, sometimes dark, sometimes offensive sense of humor. It’s my favorite thing about her and she is good medicine whenever she’s around.
Shortly after arriving at her house on the first night of our drive, we began talking about my mammogram. I was desperate to talk to her, to somehow make sense of this not-normal thing that was happening to me. I started the conversation by asking Frank if Mary told him about my mammogram. He nodded, and Mary immediately chimed in, “Poor thing. You come to visit a few weeks ago and suddenly have to ask yourself, Is this shit contagious?” We hadn’t been there for more than three minutes and she already had me crying in laughter. It was exactly what I needed.
In that moment, I remember thinking, “This is what finding healing in cancer looks like. I CAN do this.”