Talking about serious illness publicly is such a personal decision.  There are so many valid reasons not to share the journey.  Many have employment concerns.  Many are in relationships or spaces where they don’t feel safe sharing their journey.  And many other reasons.  This post isn’t meant to shame anyone or to claim my way is the right way, it’s just the right way for me.  Everyone’s cancer journey should be respected.  It is, after all, their journey. 

I kept my cancer diagnosis pretty close to the vest for a year.  To be frank, I was in shock.  I had 3 & 4 year old kids, I was going through all sorts of therapy and seeing all sorts of specialists, and my life was turned upside down.  I didn’t have my feet underneath me.  Everything was a blur.

At the one year mark, I started breaking down.  My oncologist had suggested seeing a therapist early on in my journey and I had told him I was fine.  At an appointment around my one year anniversary, I took him up on the suggestion.

I met with the therapist at my oncology clinic.  When she saw my diagnosis date she said, “I’m not surprised to see you here.”  You see, anniversaries are hard.  As the seasons change, and things like holidays come around, all the trauma comes back with it.  And after a year, I had the space and mental capacity to begin to process it all.  It was a lot.  (Dear fellow citizens, Get ready for March, after the holidays and the election is over.  This country is going to be processing a whole lot this spring.)  But as I worked through my trauma and reactions to everything with my therapist, I was able to expand my view and start to see how my journey was not just my journey; everyone close to me was affected.

This is the moment I decided to go public with my diagnosis.  And by public I mean, I no longer kept it a secret from anyone who wanted to know.  Another exhausting thing about being sick is having to constantly qualify yourself to those around you.  So many people are not willing to take no for an answer without qualification.  I don’t owe them anything, but in some circumstances, it’s just easier to come out with it so we can all move forward.

But those people aren’t the people I was doing it for.  I did it for my loved ones.  I did it because I wanted my kids and my husband and my family to feel comfortable talking about THEIR experiences and THEIR journeys surrounding my cancer with whomever they needed to.  Their journeys and their mental health and their feelings are just as valid and important as mine.  Their experiences matter, so very much.   

My kids have talked through their concerns with a counselor over the past few years.  When working out the details of counseling via Zoom during the pandemic, the counselor advised that the kids should be in places where they can talk with her privately.  As we talked through things, I told her I didn’t need to be briefed at all unless there was something worrisome being shared that she thought I needed to know.  She thanked me for trusting her, but in the end, it’s not about me trusting her (it is a little bit while my kids are young), it’s about them trusting her.  One of the uncomfortable truths we all have to face during this journey is that I might not be around throughout their entire childhoods to guide them through this.  Giving them the tools they need and the freedom to use them might be the best gift I could ever give them.

 When you decide to “go public,” it’s a vulnerable position to be in.  It’s not easy.  There is no easy option.  Some people show up.  Some people go away.  Some people don’t care.  Some people will ask a long series of invasive questions you don’t want to answer.  You have to be ready for all of those things.  But the mental health of my family has made all the awkward and difficult conversations worth it.  We’re all in this together.