I haven’t been normal sick in a long time. Everything in the last year and a half, probably longer, was cancer related. I successfully avoided getting anything last year by avoiding people and friends being considerate of my compromised immune system. I’ve been terrified of a fever for a year and a half. Even a low grade fever meant I had to go into the doctor. I have no reason to be at this point. I don’t have a compromised immune system anymore. Well, other than no spleen, but I had a bunch of vaccines because of that.
I’ve been sick since about New Year’s Day. The other night I finally had a fever. A fever still scares me. A lot more than I thought it would. It wasn’t high enough I would have had to call the doctor even a year ago, but it still scared me. I know it’s probably a simple virus, maybe the flu, probably a cold, but that doesn’t mean my brain doesn’t go scary places. Thankfully I have my silly nursemaids, that are very good at snuggling and sleeping, to keep me company and don’t judge me for whining a lot and not getting off the couch.
I’ve been laying in the couch miserable for days and all I can think is this is so terrible, but then I think no, it’s not that bad. It’s 1000x better than a year ago. But being sick means something so different now. Somehow a cold isn’t just a cold. Getting sick reminds me of all the awfulness I went through. Maybe it’s because a year ago I was prepping for the mother of all surgeries.
I feel like a year of my life was stolen from me and even though I’ve been living it up over the last six months I think all these one year memories are upsetting me more than I realized. They aren’t good reminders. I mean the one year from my last day of chemo was a nice thing to realize, but now we’re coming up on my surgery and the miserable six months that followed.
I have my one year scans coming up really soon. Maybe one of these days I won’t be counting everything from one year ago.