I live on a farm …

“Hope you are well …”

The title of this post comes from the tag end of a comment left by coffeespaz on the last blog I posted. I just read her comment, just before I set about writing today’s post and decided to open with her close … “Hope you are well, and Happy New Year!”

Today I am well: better yet, I know I am well. Now I want you to know that I am well. I have received quite a few emails over the past couple of months inquiring as to my health because I have not posted many times lately. It is very appreciated, the concern and the friendship.

So, here is the truth and after I tell the truth I will explain an important reason for telling the truth in this public manner.

For the past few months there have been certain phoenomena going on with my body, and I have been two see a few different doctors to see if someone could get a handle on what it was. Of course, the details are not important, details are far too personal. Three weeks ago my primary doctor decided to have a few tests done to rule out a type of cancer: oh yikes, that word. It is a problem, isn’t it.

It is an uncomfortable word to say outloud if it seems it might be any where near you or someone you love. When my doctor first mentioned the possibility he didn’t use the word outright, he used some other word that allowed me to pretend I didn’t entirely understand what he was saying he wanted to have tested and ruled out.

When I told the people closest to me about the tests, I also used the substitute word as if by not saying the real word outloud I could somehow keep it a safe distance away from me and from all of us.

The following day I went for a CAT-scan, and then I waited 24 hours or so to call my doctor’s office and find out that yes indeed, he wanted me to go on to a specialist for another kind of test.

To be very honest, I was very upset by the subject being entered into. My oldest brother died just a few years ago at my age from a type of cancer. He was my age at that time, and it was this time of year when he got the news. A two or three months later he was gone. Those facts were very difficult to keep out of my mind, no matter how positive I was or how strong my faith is. Life is life, and sometimes life sucks and I realized that it could be possible that after all of this recent happiness perhaps my life was going to suck after all. I apologize for being crude, but I that is how I felt about it all.

When I sat down to write my blog and I was stumped. I didn’t know what to say, because my blog is all about positive inspiration, reinforcing dreams, encouraging people to find magic in their lives, and so on. What did I have to say along those lines, what could I do to inspire others when I wasn’t feeling quite right about my own life.

It occurred to me that I could write an honest blog about what was going on with me, but I was torn as to whether or not it was the right thing to do. In the end, I realized I had a responsibility to write about this experience because that is what I do in my blog. I open up about my experiences in life and how I deal with them.

I feel a responsibility to do so at this point because I have received many comments and emails from people who have been touched and inspired by my communication over the past couple of years. I know I have a positive way of dealing with problems and situations that come up in life. By sharing my experiences and how I face them — good or bad — I might touch the life of one person on one particular day when they needed courage and encouragement the most. If each one of my posts touches just one person in that way, somewhere along the line, then I know I am making a difference in a troubled world.

So, I write.

I sat down that day and wrote what I felt was an honest, somewhat raw, high quality post about what I was facing and how I intended to deal with it. Mostly I wanted to deal with it by saying it outloud to someone, removing and releasing fear in the doing.

As I wrote that blog my mind shifted from being worried and somewhat afraid to being strong and actually looking forward to the possibility of an opportunity to face something difficult and finding a way to beat it.

What I wrote about in that blog was what I would do if I was told I had cancer, of how I would create my life and my life’s works bigger, brighter, more colorful, bolder, with more energy. If I was told I had somekind of cancer I would work even hard on creating my life and making it as joyous as I could.

By the time I finished that blog I felt much better and knew that no matter what the doctor’s came up with that was going on inside of my body that I would ultimately be a point of “cause” in my own life in determining my own attitude about whatever news, details, or events would come. I would not allow any kind of illness or medical situation determine my level of happiness, the strength of my sense of faith, or the vigor with which I dream of the future I am interested in experiencing.

I clicked “Save Draft” in my wordpress.com blog dashboard, and waited while the draft was saved. Then I went back to the draft to read through it, and it was gone. Completely and utterly erased as if I had never written a word of it. Gone, kaput, vanished.

Soon my husband came home and I told him about my well crafted blog post I had just written that vanished out of thin air. I told him that perhaps it disappeared because, perhaps I wasn’t supposed to tell that story afterall. Then he said something so simple and so clear, “Maybe it was important for you to write it.”

I knew he was right. I told him I wanted us to say the “C” word outloud to each other, that I wanted us to confront the fact together that I was being examined to see if a cancer was in my body. I feel strongly that if there is something I fear, I need to walk toward it and confront it rather than shirking away. For me, if I can face something scary I have a shot at being bigger and badder than whatever that thing is. If I was going to have cancer, I wanted cancer to think of me as if I was Shaft.

I asked my husband to share in that attitude with me and that together we would face whatever the truth was, maintain strong faith, and win any battles we needed to win together as a team.

He is a very fine and good man and husband. Of course, he was on board with me.

It was liberating to turn the “C” word (with a capital “C”) into the “c” word … lower case.

So, today I went to the hospital and a specialist performed a procedure and then he told me, with my husband there with me, that indeed everything was actually fine. There was a simple, benign explanation for the odd phenomon that ultimately led me down this path. He pronounced me well.

We smiled and here I am.

But I will tell you this, even if the news had been different I assure you I would have followed through on my big bold plans and the Shaft attitude. And you know about Shaft, he’s a bad mother … I guess I better shut my mouth … but you can dig it.

By the way, while this has all been going on I have been taking it a bit easy. That has allowed me some time to play around with needle felting, and also to continue on with knitting baby items. You can see my most recent needle felted critters and knitting projects at The Knitting Blog.

Meanwhile, I hope you are well and that you are starting off a great week with a fine day.

Best wishes,
firefly