As a substitute teacher, I just finished up some training about trauma informed teaching. It asked you to reflect on experiences you’ve had in your life that were traumatic and to identify triggers. I can certainly come up with a few associated with my breast cancer journey, but trauma can be all kinds of things. It can be a parent never saying they were proud of you. It can be a grandparent passing away. It could be about that time you were left behind at a bus stop. It can be not having enough food. Really, it can be anything that caused stress – once or chronically.
This morning, I was triggered. And it came so softly and hit me with such a wallop that my day stopped. It just stopped.
A morning show duo was doing their regular schtick this morning while I was driving my daughter to school. (Facebook and 95.7 The Jet Mornings with Jodi & Bender - 95.7 The Jet (iheart.com)– yes, a shameless plug) Out of nowhere, Jodi gave an update on the colonoscopy she had had two months ago. Honestly, we had forgotten all about it, even though at the time it was a well thought out comedic genius about something no one ever wants to go through. Her story: She was almost two years behind the recommended date of her first colonoscopy. She was fairly confident that she could time her drinking of the laxative (it’s really more than a laxative, though, isn’t it) during breaks in her normal morning show job, which is delivering news, chatting with Bender and doing the trivia show they are known nationwide for. She would start the show, then drink the goo, then run to the bathroom at commercial breaks and when the music was nonstop. Bender said it was absolutely not possible. People texted and messaged that she would never be able to do it. Turns out, she could.
But after her procedure, no one heard about how it went. Literally, no one talked about it. Turns out, they found cancer. She said on air- and I could hear her tear up – that she never expected to be someone who said “I have cancer” out loud. She has no history of cancer in her family. She never thought that the first time she had a procedure, they would find something.
This hit home. Real hard. Because, same. Because in my first mammogram, ever, they found cancer. So all those feelings swept me up. I held it together and made some parental side comments out loud as I was turning the corner to school that it was important to get check ups and take our health seriously. I’m sure that earned me an eyeroll from the tween.
Jodi continued to talk about the plan to have surgery (“A traveling robot is doing my surgery!”) over the holiday break and that if all goes well, that’s all she will have to do, and this part of her health journey will be over and she can go back to normal. But she admitted that there have been dark days. That she is grateful for being busy and having a job that can distract her. But when she gets home, it hits her again. That she has this thing that is happening.
Boom. Slammed by another trigger. Boy does that bring back some hard memories. I just wanted to scream, “SAME, GIRL.” But at the same time, that seemed inappropriate. Because she was crying, and I was crying.
My daughter has never escaped the car faster. She unbuckled her seatbelt before I stopped the car. She yelled the name of a few friends she saw and scurried out without even a goodbye.
Because trauma comes in all forms. Even if it’s from when your mom went through cancer and even though your mom thinks she was really good at hiding things, you could still see through the cracks. I know she knew that it hit home for me. It was generous of her not to make eye contact.
After I pulled away, Jodi said she was fine and that she was most worried about her son and that he was scared and that was the worst part for her.
Same, girl. Cue the actual sobbing. It was absolutely the worst part. Her son is older than my kids when I went through this, but as parents, we all hate seeing our kids suffer, whether it be from fear of losing their parent or just fear of the unknown, or something more tangible. The unknown just sucks. You can exclaim jubilantly that you love an adventure and that is all the unknown is – an adventure! – but reality is that the unknown comes with a whole box of anxiety. Because we are human.
I got home and fractured apart. Tears streamed down my face as I took the breakfast dishes from the sink into the dishwasher. I answered emails while wiping my nose on my sleeve. I kept going. Just like I did before. Just like Jodi will.
In dark, scary, uncertain times, we tend to feel alone. We tend to think that this is only happening to us. Why ME? Why NOW? What if? But at the same time as this bubbled up all the trauma from my cancer journey, it made me realize that so many people are going through this right now. We are not, in fact, alone.
Trauma is everywhere. And it hits us at expected times like anniversaries, and unexpected times like listening to a radio show on the drive to school. It hits us during the holidays. It hits us on a random fall day. I am guessing that the rest of my day will be quite normal, but there will be a cloud following me. Today, I will own that cloud. I will drag it on a string around like a balloon behind me. I will acknowledge it because it’s part of my journey to where I am today. And I am here, today. And that’s good enough.
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