No Cancer Cells Detected

Let me start by saying everyone's 4 favourite words...'no cancer cells detected'. Yayyyyyyy! We can all breath again. And what a sweet breath of relief it is. Here's how it all went down.

I had my biopsy on Monday 4th of January. That day was also my two year cancer-free-anniversary. A biopsy is no way to celebrate so the anniversary came and went without much hoo ha.

The next few days of waiting were actually ok. After I posted my blog I had lots of lovely people remind me that I'm not alone in this. We all piled into the rollercoaster together and it started chugging on an upward trajectory. Things were good.

I visited with my family that week too. Again, I was reminded how loved I was and why the hell I'd moved from freezing Melbourne to the humidity-laded state that is Queensland. Family.

The weekend though brought a downturn in the rollercoaster. You see, back in October 2018, I was mid-treatment when a woman in the UK reached out to me via Instagram. Helen. She was right at the beginning of what would end up being a cervical cancer journey of her own. Over the past two years we told each other everything. She bought a One Tough Chick shirt, wore it to her chemo sessions. She told me when she got drunk on pink gin, celebrated my cancer-free status and told me she wanted me to write her story when she beat this thing for herself. This weekend just gone, I found out that she had passed away. Her Stage 4 cervical cancer had taken her life. When you're waiting on biopsy results, finding out that a friend with the same kind of cancer as you just died doesn't exactly raise the spirits.

My birthday was on Sunday though and picking mangoes with my family brought the rollercoaster up again.

When Monday rolled around and I called the hospital over and over, eager to hassle them for my results, the nerves kicked in. I felt sick. While I knew deep down that this biopsy was precautionary, I was scared.

I finally got hold of someone and her monotone words went something like this...

"Let me just bring up your chart. Hm, so biopsy was a week ago. Yep, the doctor looked at the results on Friday, or maybe Thursday. They were happy."

Ahhhh....that's a little vague for me. I pressed on.

"No cancer cells were detected," she said. I audibly sighed with relief and made some sarcastic "well that's good then" kind of comment as she continued about how they'd see me in March for my next checkup. And that was it. I was still cancer-free. And it was all very low key.

I was not low key when I got off the phone. Poor Nuptse copped the brunt of my enthusiasm when I ran over, smooshed his confused, sleepy puppy face and told him I didn't have cancer. He promptly fell back asleep. I, however, was very damn excited.

Thanks for joining me in the waiting game! The cancer rollercoaster really is much more bearable with friends.

Cheers to being 2 years and 1 week cancer-free.