![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
itsphoebemarieI had cancer when I was 36. I'm 49 now. So yeah. Obviously I survived. But there were/are late and long term side effects. And even at 13 years out, sometimes they pop up at the most inopportune times to really slap me in the face and remind me that things will never really be "right" again.
2 hours ago, I wet my pants at the farmer's market. Ryan and I went out for an early dinner at my favorite little townie bar 30 minutes from home. We had a delicious dinner and a nice time being out together. The greatest local farm market is on the way home, so we stopped to get some good stuff from their deli counter. 5 minutes into shopping, I realized I was going to pee. Not "I had to" pee. I was GOING TO pee. They have no bathroom. I tried to stand very still, pretending to inspect the brussel sprouts. But I just don't have the ability to "hold it" anymore. Somehow I held it together to shuffle to the checkout and out to the car. Ryan unlocked my door, and I had to confess what happened and ask him to hand me a stack of napkins from the driver side door pocket. I cried most of the way home. It was snowing terribly and he sped through red lights without speaking.
Home, clean, and settled now, I still keep bursting into tears. After my cancer treatments, I had multiple problems with my bladder and bowels. I went through hyperbaric oxygen chamber treatments to heal some of the damage my radiation caused, but I also still had to have surgeries as well. One of those surgeries basically cut the muscle that you can tense to hold in farts and poops. So yeah. I toot uncontrollably now, which don't care about. And I've learned to manage my poopin schedule so as to not end up in a situation where not being able to "hold it" is a problem (though if I've got a tummy ache, you can bet your own functional ass that I'm not leaving the house).
So yeah. Tonight's realization that there was no warning between "have to" and "going to" pee came as a shock and a significant upset.
Will I be ok? Yeah. Eventually. For now I'm still sad and humiliated, even though I know Ryan could care less.
It's just hard when it's been 13 years and cancer keeps taking.
2 hours ago, I wet my pants at the farmer's market. Ryan and I went out for an early dinner at my favorite little townie bar 30 minutes from home. We had a delicious dinner and a nice time being out together. The greatest local farm market is on the way home, so we stopped to get some good stuff from their deli counter. 5 minutes into shopping, I realized I was going to pee. Not "I had to" pee. I was GOING TO pee. They have no bathroom. I tried to stand very still, pretending to inspect the brussel sprouts. But I just don't have the ability to "hold it" anymore. Somehow I held it together to shuffle to the checkout and out to the car. Ryan unlocked my door, and I had to confess what happened and ask him to hand me a stack of napkins from the driver side door pocket. I cried most of the way home. It was snowing terribly and he sped through red lights without speaking.
Home, clean, and settled now, I still keep bursting into tears. After my cancer treatments, I had multiple problems with my bladder and bowels. I went through hyperbaric oxygen chamber treatments to heal some of the damage my radiation caused, but I also still had to have surgeries as well. One of those surgeries basically cut the muscle that you can tense to hold in farts and poops. So yeah. I toot uncontrollably now, which don't care about. And I've learned to manage my poopin schedule so as to not end up in a situation where not being able to "hold it" is a problem (though if I've got a tummy ache, you can bet your own functional ass that I'm not leaving the house).
So yeah. Tonight's realization that there was no warning between "have to" and "going to" pee came as a shock and a significant upset.
Will I be ok? Yeah. Eventually. For now I'm still sad and humiliated, even though I know Ryan could care less.
It's just hard when it's been 13 years and cancer keeps taking.
no subject
Date: 2025-01-20 02:10 am (UTC)I'm sorry it is so hard for you. It is more than understandable why it hurts. The reality of cancer is nothing like the television or any other imagined storybook "prettied-up" version.
no subject
Date: 2025-01-20 01:53 pm (UTC)Also, I'm grateful to have another connection here. I poked through, and very much enjoyed, your writings and hope you don't mind I followed you.
no subject
Date: 2025-01-20 12:10 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-01-20 01:43 pm (UTC)And I am so sorry about your mom. Discussing survivorship issues can feel tricky sometimes with the whole reality of survivor's guilt really setting in the longer I'm here. But I also always feel like it's important somehow.
Thank you for listening and for being here.