THAT GIRL/THIS GIRL

Back in 2001, I opened a LiveJournal (LJ) account and started journaling.  Through my many years of activity on the site, I met gobs of fabulous people, many of whom are now among my closest friends.  Some of them live nearby, some live in other parts of the country, but all of them experienced some of my "formative" adult years.  We were all blogging and participating in a social network before either of those terms existed in our vernacular.  When I started my LJ, I was 30 years old, weighed over 200 pounds, wasn't overly excited about my career, and was very, very single.

In 2003, I got married, had twins, moved, and was diagnosed with breast cancer when our kids were 6 weeks old.  It was quite a year, and it's all recorded in 1s and 0s in my LJ account.  I had not anticipated having to go through chemo during that bout...but in February of 2004, I found out that I would have to have at least 4 rounds of Cytoxan and Taxotere.

Yesterday afternoon, I read through those journal entries to gain some insight into what chemo was really like.  And I walked away with this general impression:

"Who the hell is that whiner?"

Oh my GOD!  I could not stand reading those posts.  I even skipped over some parts because I couldn't take the complaining anymore.  I'm serious--I was disgusted with myself for throwing myself such a massive pity party.

A few hours later, one of my LJ friends makes a post about in her journal about me.  A long, beautiful post, full of words like..."amazing," "awesome," "grace," and "hero."  Hero?  Seriously???  She lived through those whiny posts and calls me a hero???

As I processed this in my Ativan induced coma last night, I realized that perhaps I wasn't as whiny as I thought.  I had met my husband, gotten married, spent 8 months pregnant with twins, sold a home and bought a home all in the course of a year.  Then WHAM.  Cancer.  Surgery.  Chemo.

Any of you who have been pregnant can appreciate the toll that growing a person takes on your body.  Toss another person in there to bake at the same time and boy-howdy is that a special kind of exhaustion.  Then they slice you open, and a few days later, you go home with a big belly wound and two (adorable) balls of Demand.  You don't sleep: you nap, on and off, for 3 months.  Toss in a move, a cancer diagnosis, and a mastectomy, and you've entered one of Dante's Rings of Hell.

THAT GIRL--the one who had spent 8 months pregnant, then had a c-section, brought home newborn twins, then had a mastectomy a few months before moving--THAT GIRL then had to undergo 4 rounds of chemo.  THAT GIRL gets to whine a little.  In fact, THAT GIRL gets to whine as much as she wants to whine, and I'm going to listen to her.

But THIS GIRL has spent the last 8 months learning to run.  Literally.  THIS GIRL had never put on a pair of running shoes in her life, and she did three 5K races this fall.  THIS GIRL signed up to run a half marathon in June.  THIS GIRL has a great husband, sweet children, fabulous parents, the most amazing friends, a thriving career, and now she's a runner.  Make no mistake, THIS GIRL will be whining a little every so often, but THAT GIRL could never imagine THIS GIRL:  THIS GIRL is starting the journey stronger, faster, and happier than THAT GIRL could ever imagine herself.