It is my sixth month anniversary of my excision…Six months since the diagnosis of melanoma became real. I was aware of the fact that there was an invader in my system; but that morning, riding in the car with my husband and my parents to the dermatologist’s office, the fact that I had skin cancer was very real in a visceral way. I think up until that point, I was aware of the fact like I’m aware of the fact that there’s a magnetic field surrounding the planet – people smarter than me told me it’s a fact, but it’s not until you see the Northern Lights that you realize that it’s really, truly there.
The details of that day are pretty clear in my mind. Since you are not knocked out, only given local numbing injections, you don’t lose time and things don’t get foggy. I can still recall that searing pain when the doctor was stitching me up in a place where the injections didn’t numb. I can still recall having to hold my leg up to get the swaddling bandages all put into place. I can still recall the tears in my mom’s eyes when I hobbled out to the waiting area. Whether those were tears of concern, relief, or sadness – I don’t know. She refused to talk, preferring to try to get me comfortable for the ride home.
Six months since the day that I had to recognize that I’m not immortal, that I was going to be scarred from this experience, that the word cancer was going to be part of my personal lexicon. Even though I was diagnosed three weeks earlier, it’s been six months since everything the doctor told me on the phone that Wednesday became real.
But it’s also been six months of no further cancer detected, six months of gaining my strength back, six months of making changes in my life to make me happy about the person I am becoming. Six months of being reborn, in a sense.