Terminal Cancer: Living with My Diagnosis
What is it like to live with a terminal illness? Maria Villalobos, who was told her cancer was incurable over two years ago, describes her battle to maintain a normal life.
By Maria Villalobos
We all know that cancer doesn’t discriminate. Anyone can get cancer. But it won’t happen to me … right?
We also have a vague idea of what cancer looks like. We’ve all seen it portrayed in the movies or on TV as a bald, thin shadow of a person puking their guts out over a toilet seat or even as a person who, in a wild turn of events, breaks bad and decides that cooking meth is the best way to pay for his medical bills.
Reality of life with cancer
In fact, both of these stories carry a shade of truth (yes, even the meth guy). But real cancer doesn’t follow a Hollywood script. It’s not all sadness and despair, nor is it always some kind of enlightening experience where all the characters learn life lessons. Real cancer is many things, but, for the most part, real cancer kinda sucks.
Now I know I am supposed to be writing about the positive things in my life and how having cancer has transformed my life philosophy or how I now do yoga every day or meditate under a waterfall or how I finally set aside time to write that novel I’ve always wanted to work on, but it wouldn’t be true. And I’ve been asked several times to write or speak about my experiences with the caveat of focusing only on the positive and illuminating experiences, as if cancer were a giant pink ribbon of glitter.
But real cancer doesn’t follow a Hollywood script. It’s not all sadness and despair, nor is it always some kind of enlightening experience where all the characters learn life lessons.
The reality is, however, that cancer is not a pink ribbon or a shower of glitter. While there are many blessings that have come into my life as a direct result of having cancer, cancer still sucks and I’d still rather not have it.
Cancer hurtled into my life
As I said, cancer doesn’t discriminate and it didn’t hold any punches when it found me. It hurtled into my life with the force of a cannonball and it changed my life forever. Bad news, information and treatment options came as a rapid-fire barrage that was almost impossible to process and all the while I was asking myself “I have cancer? I have cancer? How could this happen?” The day before I had been at work, living a normal life. Now I was a cancer patient with an expiration date. And the date was way too soon.
I wanted to wake up from that reality or for someone to tell me that there had been a mistake at the lab. But it turned out I had breast cancer and, not only that, the cancer was so advanced that it had enveloped my liver and permeated my spine. I was being told to go home and spend the time I had left with my family. All the scans, the data and the doctors were telling me that this was the final chapter, that everything - that my life - was coming to an end.
Focusing on one step at a time
My confusion and bewilderment led to a refusal of what I was hearing. I wouldn’t let this be the final chapter, I wouldn’t let this be the end. I walked out of those doctors’ offices and serendipitously encountered a doctor at a different hospital who didn’t give me a date or a timeline. He only gave me the step in front of me and so, any time I got worried or scared about the future or started thinking too far ahead, he would just draw my attention back to the next step. It turned out that his advice was just what I needed to push forward and find a strength inside me that I never knew existed. My doctor focused on me as a person and gave me hope for the future - hope of a future.
But I’d trade all these life lessons and self-reflection for a body without cancer at the drop of a hat.
It’s now more than two years past my original expiration date, but I am still living with cancer. I’d say those days surrounding my diagnosis are etched into my memory, but to say that would imply that I’ve moved past that time. Those days are not lost to the past, they are a part of who I am now and they were the beginning of a new future for me.
Living with cancer
It’s impossible to explain what it is like to live with cancer to someone who doesn’t know, especially since it can be so different for different people. In some ways, the most shocking thing about my life with cancer is how normal it all is. I wake up. I feed my dogs. I go to work. I come home. I take the dogs for a walk. I watch Netflix with my husband. I don’t think it’s possible to be thinking about the fact that I have cancer all the time. I don’t think I could survive that. Instead, cancer is often the background noise that is easy to ignore until something points it out and then suddenly it’s all you can hear. In Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events, the narrator sums up the feeling perfectly: “It is like walking up the stairs to your bedroom in the dark, and thinking there is one more stair than there is. Your foot falls down, through the air, and there is a sickly moment of dark surprise as you try to readjust the way you thought of things.”
We don’t need dietary advice, an article about some magical jungle plant or “Keep Fighting” stickers, we just need more normal.
Cancer sucks and just focusing on the positive is a futile activity. But that doesn’t mean that cancer should drain all the positivity out of your life. It certainly hasn’t done so for me. I love my life and I am thankful for all that I have. I am still the happy, laughing and smiling person that I always was. And there are even times when I forget that it is there. If it weren’t for the occasional side effects of my medications or a movie scene that reflects my hopes for the future, I could go a few long hours without cancer ever crossing my mind. And I have learned from it all and I’ve even had great experiences that I never would have had if I didn’t have cancer. I have learned more about myself and grown as a person just like they do in the movies. But I’d trade all these life lessons and self-reflection for a body without cancer at the drop of a hat.
Remember...
It’s important for those who know or interact with people who have cancer to recognize this aspect of a cancer patient’s life. As cancer patients, our lives can be mostly normal and we don’t always need reminding that we have a disease. Our lives can be wonderful, bright and full of laughter and our lives can be difficult, exhausting and painful. Medication, doctors and hospital visits play an important and often difficult role in our lives, but they are also the ultimate source of our path forward. When we are away from the hospital we don’t need dietary advice, an article about some magical jungle plant or “Keep Fighting” stickers, we just need more normal.
It’s true that cancer sucks, but my life is wonderful because cancer doesn’t define my life. Cancer is a part of who I am and it forever will be. It has left physical and emotional scars on me and those close to me, but if you see me walking down the street you can talk to me about whatever you want. Just remember that I left my cancer at the hospital.
Photo by Ruban Hutabar on Unsplash .
About the Author
Maria is cofounder of Beyond Boobs, a support group for breast cancer patients in Bangkok. Originally from Bolivia, Maria moved to Bangkok six years ago and began working in the jewelry industry. She was diagnosed with metastatic breast cancer in April 2016 at the age of 30. Maria continues to love living in Bangkok. Indeed, she chose to receive all her treatment here and not to give up the beautiful life she had built for herself in this magical country. You can reach Maria and Beyond Boobs through the Beyond Boobs Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/beyondboobsbangkok/.
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