You never forget the day you get the news. You struggle to find words for how you feel but the only thing you can come up with is to ask why something so bad has to happen to someone so good. A diagnosis is a life altering, earth shaking experience and for a lot of people, it can crumble the world around them.
When word finally hit home for my family that my aunt was diagnosed with cancer for the second time, my world seemed to crumble in a different way.
My life before cancer was filled with selfishness and an "I'll see you when I see you" attitude towards my family. Plans for the weekend only revolved around what parties my friends knew about or what my work schedule was. It didn't matter that much if I missed a family event here or there or if I didn't see them for a few weeks; there'd always be another day. But cancer wrecked my plans for the weekend and told me that everything that's important to me right now is not nearly as important.
My life as I knew it, was over.
Sometimes, there are days when I am just so mad and upset about everything cancer has done to me and my family, and then there are some days where I'm actually kind of thankful. Now don't get my wrong, never would I ever have wanted this to be a part of my life — but looking back never would I have wanted to continue living my life before it.
Today, there is nothing more important to me than getting to hang out with my family. Whether it be just running errands together or just hanging out, I want to spend every little moment with them because cancer showed me how precious life can be. These days I jump at the chance for all my family to be together and any plans I have to take the backseat when there's an opportunity to be with them.
The world is filled with people who will hurt you and bring you down and the one thing in life we have in life to push us back up is our family. Unfortunately, Cancer has to be one of the things in life that pull my family down, but it's shown me more and more ways how to push my family back up.
So when I say cancer ruined my life, I mean cancer ruined my selfish life. It ruined the life where I didn't see how amazing it is to spend time with the people who love me most. I never wanna lead a life where I miss out on moments with my family, but now that Cancer's shown me all this great stuff — I'd really wish it's next trick would be to get the hell out.
