What it’s like when your mom has cancer

What most people don’t know when they meet my mom is that she wears the color pink this month, not only for the millions of women who have been affected by breast cancer, but for herself. She’s a fighter. A conqueror. A survivor. And best of all, my mother.

Detected early from a mammogram check-up visit, the next day it was confirmed that my mom had breast cancer. They way I remember it was a bottomless pit of complete fear. Blindsided by such a vicious disease, I couldn’t help but immediately think of losing my mom to cancer. Her first thought was “I can fix this.” When I asked my mom what it was like to be told that she had cancer, she doesn’t have much to say. She can’t remember any of it. “The doctor became blurry,” she said. “I couldn’t even hear him.”

Attitude was made all the difference in this situation. It takes a special person to go from an out-of-nowhere diagnosis to go into “fix-it mode” for the sake of the rest of the family. Despite her fear, I never saw my mom cry. Which was strange, considering I couldn’t stop. I always thought it was because she never wanted to show her children what fear looked like, but when I asked her about it, she said, “I found out. I cried. I Googled it all. I told who I needed to tell. And I never cried again.”

Fortunately, treatment for my mom was very simple and straightforward. Surgery came two weeks after her diagnosis and then she received radiation everyday for six weeks following her operation. “Every day,  I was closer to riding the evil from my body.” After six weeks of watching rays dance on her chest, not only was she left with “tattoos” (also known as her radiation scars), but she walked away from her last treatment cancer-free.

Everyone fights their own fight. No journey is the same. And sometimes there isn’t much you can say to make someone feel better. But the way my mom went about her road to recovery, changed the way I go about my everyday life. “Battle every step of the way. Make the hard decisions. Keep focused. And surround yourself with people you love.” As I grow up, I see it in myself. I see myself turning into the women that she is. And if anything, I hope her story can inspire anyone even in the smallest of ways.

Fear can be a very debilitating emotion and seeing it affect someone you love can really hurt…bad. But to see what she was capable of handling and the way she carried herself through it all, is so inspiring. And that is what this month is all about. Support the fighters, admire the survivors, and honor the taken. Be the hope — it is the only cure we have right now.