Breathe

My second course of chemotherapy starts in a week. I don’t dread it, but I’m not exactly excited about it either. The thing that calms me is sitting out on the front porch, waiting for the sun. There, I can just breathe.

I find that in my quiet moments, my mind no longer goes to dark places, but to gratitude. I hope that means I’m past the anxiety that the drug trial gave me. My oncologist surprised me when I pushed back against the trial for a second time. I expected him to try and argue me into trying, but he let it go fairly easily and agreed to take me off it.

Even with the drugs they’ve given me to fight my nighttime neuropathy, I’m still experiencing pain in my hips and legs at night. It takes until about 3:00 in the morning for me to be exhausted enough to fall into a deep sleep that lasts for hours. Before that all I get is little naps. Even so, when I finally wake in the morning, what I want most is my rocking chair facing the sunrise and a few moments of blissful calm. If my stomach is up to it, I have a little breakfast.

Mostly though, I just sit and watch the sunrise, filled with gratitude at being able to watch another one. Someone recently asked me and a group of others what the Holy Spirit was trying to say to us. My answer was “enjoy what you have, while you have it.” I’m grateful for the morning because it means I get another day. I’m grateful because morning means the end of my pain for approximately another 12 hours. Most of all I am grateful for these quiet, sacred moments when it’s just me and my thoughts of God.

Chemotherapy starts in a week. I’m going to use every opportunity I can find to sit in silence, appreciate what I’ve been given, and just breathe.