Surviving

OHIO - I was sitting at a dinner table with a handful of people; thingswere going great. Fun conversation, wonderful company, awesome food.

Then one person says "You know, I HATE being called a survivor. Who made up that phrase, anyway? Someone who never had cancer, I'll bet!"

We were all silent for a moment. We were all either patients or physicians, and we all just looked at her. Then, it started ...

"Me too!" "Gosh, that makes me so mad!" "Why do they think we consider ourselves done? Don't they know we still deal with it every day?"

The outpouring was impressive - I think we all just assumed we were theonly ones who thought that way, the only one who had to take meds daily, who have to wrap our arms to stop the endless swelling, the only one who knows that pain medicine is useless against bone pain. But there we were,all coming to the same realization at once.

Just because we had it once, be it 5 years, 5 months or 5 weeks ago - some of us aren't finished. We still have it hanging around and we wake up to do battle every morning.

Here's to my fellow warriors. Battle on, friends!