Going Backwards

It's four weeks since I found The Lump, two weeks since The Lump was cut out and sent off to Imperial College to be part of a student research programme (I kid you not), and another 3 days in limbo before I see the oncologist to discuss "What next?"

In that time I've had the strangest sense of going backwards, of deja vue.

The cancer journey is so spookily similar to the getting-sober-journey that it's hard to believe the timing is co-incidental. It feels like the last eight months have been a warm up to the Big Event.

And the diagnosis hit me at the exact time that I was strong enough to take it. Any earlier than eight months and I'd have been staring at the bottom of several empty bottles of sauvignon blanc before you could say 'malignant tumour.'

Like going sober, dealing with The Big C is a leap into the unknown. It's about learning to live, at least for a while, in a world of uncertainty and fear.

I wrote early on about the roller coaster of emotions when you first quit drinking (see The Sobercoaster), taking you from the pink cloud to The Wall and back again. And the last few weeks have been like that again - just more so.

I lurch from feeling thrilled at just being alive to weeping uncontrollably with the dog in parks (so the children can't see).

(See my post from the early sober days on Weeping)

The tools you use to deal with all this are the same too. You take one day at a time. Baby steps. Try not to look ahead until you know you can deal with it.

Like the early sober days, I find that I have to be kind to myself (see The Importance of Self Care). Sleep in the afternoon for a while if I have to. Have hot baths. Eat cake.

And finding a tribe is crucial. People like you who've trod the path before you and can let you know what's ahead.

I found my sober tribe online because I was too ashamed to look for a real world one.

Funnily enough, confessing to cancer is way easier than confessing to an alcohol addiction, so I'm discovering a few local ladies - Mums like me - who've been through breast cancer and out the other side and can tell me what lies ahead.

I'm also using The Haven. It's a charity funded retreat in Fulham for women with breast cancer. I'm meeting a Macmillan nurse there this morning.

Bizarrely, in my previous life I was responsible for the Macmillan Cancer Support brand strategy, and all their advertising.

It's hard not to imagine the Authors of Destiny sitting on some celestial cloud chortling and patting each other on the back at their clever use of irony.

Am I losing my mind?

Love SM x

Fate

Do you believe in fate?

Can it really be the case that the position of the stars above our heads at birth, some divine being, or our actions in past lives, can determine the way our futures unfold?

I find the idea that we are not masters of our own fate, captains of our own souls, rather unnerving. I prefer to see the future as an unfolding, featureless landscape that only we can design and mould.

But then I thought back recently to a night, almost exactly twenty years ago, in New York City.

Back then I was in my mid twenties. I was living in London, burning the candle at both ends, and working in one of the hottest Ad Agencies in town.

My new, young, CEO must have been reading up on staff motivation and retention, because he decided to award a prize for the team that created the best ad campaign of the year. My team won. The prize was an all expenses paid trip for two to Manhattan for a long weekend, staying at the newly opened, seriously hip, W Hotel.

I invited one of my best girlfriends, who was completely crazy, a real hoot, and, like me, a bad girl. She also happened to be a Countess.

Back in those days, travelling with someone with an aristocratic title was a serious bonus. We were upgraded to Business Class, and the hotel sent a stretch limo to collect us at the airport. We had a ball.

New York, years ahead of London, had instituted a ban on smoking in public places. We were both serious chimneys, and were not at all happy about this turn of events. Luckily I'd done my homework, and I found a restaurant which still, for some reason, had a smoking area. It was called Raoul's, in Soho.

The other reason I loved the sound of this place was that there was a resident fortune teller who you could consult after dinner. (I just looked up their website. It's still there, but no mention of a fortune teller any more. Shame).

French cooking, copious cigarettes and a palm reader - what's not to like? I thought. (Although that expression hadn't been invented back then).

We went to the top of a huge skyscraper first, where we sat at a chrome and glass bar and had a martini each looking over the city, then we had a wonderful dinner at Raoul's with a bottle of fine red wine.

After dinner I went and found the fortune teller. I had recently started dating Mr SM, and wanted to know if he was 'The One.'

The fortune teller was sketchy on this point. He could well be, she said, without much detail or interest.

What she did want to talk about, however, was alcohol. She said that my future involved writing and alcohol, and that I would help lots of people. She could tell I was confused, because she said that it wouldn't make any sense to me for a long time.

I wasn't just confused, I was insulted! I wasn't drunk. In those days I was a total 'normie.' Yes, I drank a fair amount, but cigarettes were my addiction back then, not booze. It would be another decade before I'd be on first name terms with the wine witch. So why was this lady banging on about booze???

Well, now it makes sense.

So was all of this just written in the stars? Was Juliet always destined to die young (see When the Wine Witch Wins)? Was I always going to become a lush?

And what next?

I still like to think that we can shape our own destiny, so long as we don't leave it in the hands of the wine witch....

What do you think?

Love SM x