Inching Closer to Public

Well, I shared the link to my blog post on Facebook moments ago. So now my tight group of friends and family who know is expanded to the 200 or so "friends" on Facebook, including a bunch of high-school friends who I haven't spoken with in about 30 years. 

Interesting.

It's not as if anything has happened recently that's driving this into a more public discussion. It's just that I might be ready.

It's hard to see your mindset change as it's happening. But over nine months, that's what's happened. In the beginning, I struggled with how to define myself -- cancer patient implies someone in active treatment; cancer survivor implies someone who has beaten cancer. Neither seemed right. I never said: I have cancer; I always said, "I was diagnosed with cancer."

Now when I look at it, I see why. Saying I have cancer is an admission of a current status. If I just say "I was diagnosed," it isolates it in the past (and in passive voice, at that). It's somewhat of a mental defense mechanism that I must have needed until I could wrap my mind around what it meant to have cancer.

I'd be lying if I said I know what it means, but I know what it doesn't mean. It doesn't mean I'm getting radiation. Or chemo. It doesn't mean I'm losing my appetite. Or my hair.

Right now, it doesn't mean anything. So I think in the next day or so, I'm going to flip the switch on the blog and go from a private blog open to just you all, to a public blog. The title: Thinking Out Loud: A Cancer Blog. And I'm going to try to commit to three posts a week. (You don't have to read them all.)

We'll see what happens. Maybe two people will read it and it will help them. Maybe two hundred will. Whatever happens, though, I'm ready.