C is for…

If you didn’t start singing “C is for cookie” in a Cookie Monster voice, we can’t be friends.

Just kidding. Kind of.

C is for a lot of things:

• Cookies
• Cake
• Candy
• Coffee
• Church
• Choir
• Cheerleading
• Coloring
• Children (mostly my own)
• Castle (as in the TV show with Nathan Fillion)
• Cuddles (with my dog Brindley of course)
• and of course, Chrisy (or Christina, as my dad would call me)

There are loads of things that start with the letter “C” that I absolutely love. But recently, I have become intimately familiar with another “C” word that I could do without.

Cancer.

Two months ago today, my annual screening mammogram turned into an additional mammogram, ultrasound and biopsy all on the same day. About 9 days later I got the results of the biopsy, and I was diagnosed with invasive lobular breast cancer. Because of my age, and other family history, I then underwent genetic testing which found that I am positive for BRCA2, a harmful variant in a particular gene that increases my risk, not only of breast cancer, but of other types of cancers as well.

I have to say, I’m not feeling too fond of that good ol’ letter “C” these days.

I have waffled back and forth whether to take this news public on a grander scale than how it naturally spreads. One day I feel like I should just keep it to myself and the circle of people around me. The next I feel like I should share my journey in case it can help others who may face this in the future. What ultimately pushed me into sharing this journey on my blog? A couple of things.

1. I process things through words. Spoken words. Written words. Words that run through my mind. To be able to sit down and write what I am thinking and feeling (and sometimes to then erase it all and start over) is therapeutic and cathartic. I am keeping a journal, which holds some of my personal thoughts (and rants, and tears), but blogging helps me to really think through things and draw connections to other areas of life.
2. I am realizing how important it is for me to hear the stories of others who have been on this journey, to hear their ups and downs, their struggles and fears, and ultimately, the way they have overcome this disease. If that helps me, then maybe my story can help others.

I’m not sure how often I will post. I’m not sure what the content will be exactly. I do know that I miss blogging and haven’t made it a priority for awhile, so this is impetus to get back to doing something that I love, hopefully in a way that is meaningful for both myself and for you, my readers.

At the end of the letter I sent to the congregation I serve telling them about this diagnosis, I wrote this:

As I was preparing to leave Greenville to relocate here for this call, a friend gave me a wall hanging, which hangs in my bathroom where I see it every day. It says, “Trust the next chapter, because you know the Author.” The circumstances in which I need to trust God may be different now than then, but the truth of this statement remains the same. 1 Thessalonians 5:18 tells us to give thanks in every situation because thanksgiving is God’s will for us. That is the stance that I will be taking throughout this journey, consistently looking for all the gifts for which I have to be grateful.

So, I will choose to end each post with something for which I am grateful. Sometimes they will be very off-the-wall or funny, because if I don’t laugh, I will be a puddle of tears on the floor.

Today I am grateful for something my husband said the other night. It isn’t profound. It wasn’t particularly supportive. But it has made me smile every day when I remember it. When asked what he was thinking about and how he was feeling in light of the BRCA2 news, he looked at me and said, “It sucks. But so does dying.”

So there you go. Cancer sucks, and I don’t plan on dying, so instead, I’ll be kicking it’s a$$.