Believe In Your Outcome

Just to reiterate, I do not re-read what I write. It comes from my heart and lands here. There will be typo's etc... Hope you don't mind.

After I left Dr. Almost Killed Me's office, I walked across the street to the parking lot with a lot of paperwork in my hands. He had given me papers with a place to get a CAT scan, a surgeons name and number, and I don't even know what else. After the words cancer came out of his mouth, all I heard was blah blah blah blah. So you know, I don't use a capital "c" when I write the word cancer. It doesn't deserve a capital letter.

I got into my car and started to cry. I felt lost, scared, and helpless. I called my mom and told her. I had seen her over the holidays, she lives in the Midwest, and her mama intuition had whispered to her while I was visiting, "Your girl has cancer." I was really thin and she just knew. In fact, she secretly made a doctors appointment for me with her doctor while I was there, but I said, "What's the point? I have my own doctors appointment scheduled for when I get back to LA?" I made her cancel the appointment. My mom never told me that she feared I had cancer. So, when I called her from the car, she broke down. She couldn't speak. She was sobbing. It was a sort of primal cry. The kind of cry a mother should never have to experience. Thank God my step father walked in from work and took the phone from her. He not only did that, he TOOK OVER. He got me home. He talked me through it. I had to drive all the way across town from Santa Monica to the Hollywood Hills. Pretty far of a drive when you're in shock.

The next day my sister ditched work, picked me up and drove me to the CAT scan facility. It was there that I tried to gain my footing. Being a Libra, I'm all about balance and this had kicked me way off of my feet. While I was drinking the gunk that you have to drink in order to get a CAT scan, it was all sinking in. I knew I had cancer even though it hadn't been made official yet and suddenly I knew I had just stepped into an episode of "Party of Five," and I was Charlie. Remember when Charlie got cancer? This was real. Shit just got REAL.

When I walked into the dressing room to change into a gown is when I decided I needed to take some of my power back. I've done this thing since I was a little girl where I will only accept certain outcomes in certain situations. No one taught me this. It's a natural instinct. Maybe it's the stubborn part of me, I don't know, but if something is very important to me, I don't allow any other possibilities to be on the table. I put all of my energy into the outcome that I want, and leave no room in my head for other possibilities. There is only one outcome that I will accept, the outcome that I want.

I was laying on the table inside the machine with the technicians coming in and out of the room. They had been viewing the scan and me through a window in an adjacent room. A female technician came in to adjust my position at one point and through small talk asked me if I had been feeling sick at all lately. Then a male technician came in at one point to do the same thing, again with the small talk and trying to be nonchalant asked me if I had been having any fevers recently. I am well aware of the fact that technicians aren't supposed to ask you questions like this. They have nonchalantly showed their hand to me and I know they see something major. Inside my head I didn't go there. By "there" I mean that ugly,horrifying, dark place. That place where you panic and feel like your brain is melting. I chose to remain calm. I turned on my automatic pilot.

The next thing I knew, I was picking my mom up from LAX. She came with a suitcase full of clothes for a week. Everything was moving pretty quickly. I had an appointment with a surgeon for a biopsy and my mom wanted to be there. She landed kind of late at night so when we got to my house, we went to bed. We fell asleep crying and she spooned me the whole night. The next morning we walk into the surgeons examining room and I see what looks like a sword (to me) laid out on the table. I said, "HO-LY SHIT," and my mom says, "Don't look at that, it's not for you." I said of course it's for me! Have I mentioned that I have a fear of needles? And doctors? And hospitals? And SWORDS? Turned out I was right and my mom was wrong. She, of course, knew all along that the sword was for me, too. After the surgeon was finished impaling my neck with her sword, she said "I am 99.8% sure that you have Hodgkins Disease, which is a form of Lymphoma." This was the first time I heard these words. I didn't know anything about Hodgkins. I knew that Charlie on "Party of Five" had it, but that's about it. When the surgeon told me that, I did feel myself start to slip into the dark place, but I made myself quickly snap back from it. I did what I always do and told myself there is only one outcome here that is acceptable and that is that I survive this beast. I WILL LIVE.

The thing is negative thoughts are exactly like cancer. If you give them an inch, they will keep growing. The mind is so powerful, you have to be very careful what you fill it with. If you want something really bad, don't let any thoughts other than the outcome that you want, enter your mind. Eat it, breathe it, live it. Believe!


Next post on angels:-)

Mama Love XO