Lessons and Gifts - Jan 2021

  “Life is made up of lessons and gifts, that’s it. Every experience is an opportunity to learn from, or a gift    to be thankful for. Or both. But that’s it. That’s all we get.”

        Colleen Patrick-Goudreau

A new year brings an opportunity to reflect on the lessons and gifts of the previous twelve months. For me, as for many, 2020 was a mixed bag. Here in New Zealand we went into strict lockdown early in the pandemic and those weeks were some of the most peaceful of my entire life. After many years putting too much emphasis on work I finally had time to rest, read, and listen to birdsong. It was a gift to be thankful for, even amongst the anxiety and fear of a pandemic.

The 'wood kennels' I made over lockdown

Right now my December 2020 breast cancer diagnosis is too new and too raw for me to clearly see where the lessons and the gifts lie, but I trust that at some point soon I will look back and know. This blog will help with that. I’m grateful that I have space to rest and reflect, but it’s a strange time of healing and waiting and wondering what comes next.

Craft

2020 was the year I finally prioritised crafting and creativity. For many years I feared I wasn’t creative or artistic and I expressed this by being disparaging about people who were. My turning point came after I read an article about wooden spoon carving and decided to take up the hobby, which opened me up to the joy of using my hands to create things both useful and beautiful. Last year I shifted to part-time work and set aside a weekly “creative day” for myself - those days were my golden gifts of 2020.

The other side of that coin, the lessons, came when I allowed the “real world” to intrude upon my creative days. The world seems to conspire against us, to drag our attention away from quiet reflection and the creative process… although, of course, it is me who allows that to happen, and I am the only person who can safeguard my creative time. The big lesson was that if I value my creativity I have to nurture and tend it, create time for it, and protect it from the endless administration of simply being alive in the modern world.

Work in progress - see References section for details

My current projects are minimal, as just one day after my breast cancer diagnosis I had an abdominal hysterectomy to remove a large fibroid. I had the abdominal surgery in mid-December 2020, and have been in recovery mode ever since. Right now I’m working on a jumper, which a lovely mindless knit that I can do without too much brain-juice. I’ve got a ton of sewing projects to work on, but as I can’t crawl around on the floor to cut out the pattern pieces, sewing is currently on hiatus.

Season

January in New Zealand is summertime time but our borders are closed so it’s only Kiwis travelling around. We aren’t going anywhere - due to my surgeries we are enjoying a "staycation" here at the cottage. Weather-wise: being this close to Wellington means we can have cold temperatures at any time of the year and sure enough, we had the heater on for two days after Christmas! It’s nicer now, a much better approximation of summer.

It’s also the season of early sunrises and I love waking up early and sitting outside listening to the birds. My health worries have collided with the dramatic current events in the United States and I need to be very aware of my mental health and take time away from the news and my phone and be out in nature. It sounds fairly clichéd but mindfulness is helping - in this moment I am safe, the breeze is warm, and I am happy - but I have definitely had my dark days, worrying about whether or not the cancer has spread. It’s the not knowing that’s hardest, once we know then we can make a plan, and then all I have to think about is the next planned thing.

Very little planning happening in this diary!

Christmas is behind us, and I took time over New Years to review the year and think ahead to 2021. I usually make a number of plans for the coming year but this time I’ve decided to just take each day, week, and treatment as it comes. I don’t know even the basics about when my radiation will start and whether I will need chemotherapy or not so it’s impossible to make plans. I suspect there’s a lesson in there about clinging less tightly and moving more with the flow.

It was strange to do nothing for Christmas lunch except eat it, and I can’t help feeling guilty that my partner is doing all the chores. As I type this I’m 3.5 weeks post-hysterectomy, and while I’m able to do more each day, I’m a long way off being a fully-functioning member of the household. Soon I’ll be having more surgery to remove this breast lump and the subsequent treatments sound pretty energy-sapping. But it’s a huge gift to have people who I can depend on when I need help.

Our firepit from above

Last night we sat outside and made a fire - another gift, having the time (and no fire ban!) to sit and watch the flames dance. I love the connection to our earliest ancestors and how powerful fire must have felt when it was first harnessed. For me, outside fires used to signal long nights drinking and telling stories, but we’ve had a couple of nights now where we just light the fire for an hour or so after dinner and enjoy it without burning through all our winter wood... and without waking up with a hangover!

Health

An actual gift I gave myself recently was a Vitamix blender, as I wanted to easily incorporate more veggies into my daily diet without having to cook more. This thing is a BEAST and I LOVE IT! It’s sort of odd-looking and it’s very expensive, but it's so powerful and smashes up greens with ease, and I can make fun things like mango and coconut ice-cream. (Not a paid promotion - just fan-gurling).

At the time of writing I’m in the weird limbo between breast cancer diagnosis and surgery, so I’m trying to balance doing healthy things with treating myself, and trying to stay positive while also being prepared. It’s not easy. There are great support services available, but I’m ok just now, and we’ll see what happens after surgery. It's been nice to have this time through the naturally liminal Christmas / New Year period where the days sort of meld into one another. It's suited the strange unreality of this period in my life.

It’s important to talk about all the things I’m feeling - I’ve had some dark days - but I don’t want to upset people who love me by talking too much about my fears. It’s strange how different this is to talking about my fibroid - that wasn’t life-threatening so it wasn’t such a big deal to 'break the news'. However, with cancer, I’m finding that I have to be mindful of how the news will affect others, and subsequently whether I’m strong enough right now to handle their emotions. This has meant I’ve only told a few people so far - it was too hard to do it over Christmas.

Anyway, once we know more following surgery I’ll probably link this blog in my Instagram and abdicate from telling anyone else - let the jungle drums do the work! I totally understand why people often keep it quiet, but that’s not how I do things - I love being open about my joys and my struggles, and I have noticed over the years that it encourages people to talk openly with me, which I appreciate.

Lulu doing the serious business of resting

I’ll talk more about the type of cancer and my treatment once the surgery is over and we have a clearer picture of the next few months. For now, I’ve decided not to drink alcohol for a while, I’m loving my green smoothies, I’m slowly getting my fitness back after the hysterectomy, and I’m taking each day as it comes. I’ve found a great way to stay rested is to impersonate our cat Lulu, she knows how to relax! When the tears come I let them, and if my partner is here I hug him and tell him what I’m feeling. I’ve also been talking to some cows down the road, they are pretty great listeners!

Closing words

Whilst the theme of this first episode is “Lessons and gifts”, that is really the theme of my life these days. Feeling gratitude for what I have and finding the lessons in the hard stuff takes up a lot of my mental space right now. It’s impossible not to feel angry and ripped off at times, but I have to trust that when I’m looking at this with the benefit of hindsight those lessons and gifts will become clear.

Thank you for joining me today, the next episode will be “High Summer” and will come out at some point in February (I can’t plan much beyond next week, so I’m keeping things loose!). If you would like to connect with me you can register and leave a comment, I’m always keen to hear from you.

If you are also on a health journey, please rest and be kind to yourself. It’s ok to say no and to be “selfish” with your time (spoiler: it's not selfish). If you are supporting someone, bless you, thank you, and please find someone kind to support you too.

References

• Colleen Patrick-Goudreau has an excellent podcast called Food for Thought. The quote that I used at the beginning is from this episode Lessons and Gifts - she talks about the theme at the 17:40 mark
• I'm making The Purl Code jumper with yarn by Susanne Jensen, purchased from the wonderful Julie at Wool on Wheels
• I'm very new to the world of breast cancer support services, but pages I've found helpful so far include https://www.breastcancersupport.co.nz/ and https://www.breastcancer.org.nz/ - the latter can send out an excellent diary for keeping track of your appointments and treatments