Post CancerCon Blues
This has been an interesting week, to say the least. Not only have the post CancerCon blues set in, but I also found out that it is going to be harder for people with pre-existing conditions to get insurance. This week I also celebrated my best friend’s 22nd birthday and her 2nd birthday in heaven. And I just found out that another good friend of mine has passed away from her cancer. To say this week has been emotionally draining is an understatement.
“The people who do understand I just left at CancerCon.”
Since coming back from CancerCon and getting back into my real life, I am carrying the weight of this around with me and I have no one to talk to about it because I feel no one understands. The people who do understand I just left at CancerCon. So I have been posting to Facebook where my cancer family can support me.
“A place where I don’t have to pretend everything is okay.”
CancerCon is great because it brings freedom and unity. It is a place where I can be myself and not have to hide. A place where I don’t have to pretend everything is okay. At any point, I can talk about any of these things with any of the people in the room. Here, in the real world, people who don’t experience these things won’t understand. I can’t just tell them I have post CancerCon blues and have them understand what it is like. There is just this freedom that I haven’t been able to experience anywhere else.
I think a lot of it has to deal with the elephant in the room. At CancerCon, the elephant doesn’t exist, he has the weekend off. I feel like in my real life there is this cancer elephant always following me around, sometimes the elephant is more transparent than other times. Like when I’m at my house, it’s pretty free. But out in public, it can get awkward.
“At CancerCon, the elephant doesn’t exist, he has the weekend off.”
People don’t know how to react to my elephant, they don’t know whether to ask me about it, or not, or even how to bring it up. At CancerCon, we all know what it is like to have this elephant and we aren’t scared to ask each other, “What kind of cancer do you have?” And once you answer, you know the response of the person who asked isn’t going to be, “Oh, I’m sorry to hear that. You’re so strong.”
At CancerCon, everyone there would understand what my week was like; what it is like to lose a friend to this disease. I have lost several friends and according to the memory board at CancerCon, we all have. We all get it.
If I were to ask any of my ‘normal’ friends they most likely haven’t lost any of their friends. Whereas, just this week, I am celebrating two of my friends. One who got their wings and one who is missing another birthday. My normal friends just wouldn’t understand and, “Oh, I’m so sorry,” just doesn’t help. At all.
“My normal friends just wouldn’t understand and, “Oh, I’m so sorry,” just doesn’t help.”
There are a lot that my normal friends just won’t understand. Which is what is so nice about CancerCon. Everyone there just understands and it does not suck explaining myself because there simply is no need to.
CancerCon is a place where our playing field is level. In the real world, I feel like the people who know I have cancer hold me to a higher standard than everyone else. In the real world, I have some worldly knowledge because I have been though so much in my few years. At CancerCon, I don’t have to be the sole superhero.
“CancerCon is a place where our playing field is level.”
I feel like CancerCon is a convention for superheroes. It’s a weekend where we get to hang up our capes and celebrate our victories; share our battle stories with our fellow superheroes. But, because we are all superheroes here, it’s like, for once, we can act like normal people. But this ‘acting normal’ only lasts for a weekend because then it is back to saving the world by ourselves, or maybe our lives.
