I am what a Cancer Survivor looks like!

I have been featured as a "Cancer Survivor Success Story"!!

Read it online - http://www.runninghightees.com/pages/SurvivorSuccessStories.php

In October, 2008 I was diagnosed with Breast Cancer. I was 42 years old with no family history. My kids were 2 and 4. It was the last thing in the world that I had expected would ever happen to me.

I had found a lump while breastfeeding the previous year. My doctor sent me for an ultrasound, and I was told it was just milk, nothing to worry about. So I didn't. However, when I weaned my son the following summer, it was apparent that something was very wrong. By the time I was diagnosed, my tumour was large, and the cancer had spread into my lymph nodes.

To say I was devastated would be an understatement. But the one benefit of not finding it early was that I was prepared to throw every treatment available at it. I had a Mastectomy just before Christmas, and started 6 rounds of Chemo the following January. The "Cadillac" of Chemo's according to my oncologist! Well, it hit me hard. The first drugs made me sick, the second one gave me debilitating pain. But, throughout it all I tried to walk every day, even when I could hardly walk in a straight line! I found exercise helped me - the brain fog lifted, and I felt more connected to the outside world.

A week before my last chemo treatment I developed a fever - tests showed that my White Blood count was zero - my body had no way of fighting off infection. So, I was admitted into hospital. I remember being taken from the ER up to a ward - in a wheel chair, bald, with a face mask, hospital gown and an IV pole. As we went through the hospital, people looked at me with a mix of pity and fear - to them I looked like a "cancer patient", sickly and weak. I remember thinking I never wanted people to look at me that way again.

There was something about being brought so low physically by my treatment, that made me really want to start pushing myself. By the time I finished all my treatment (radiation followed by more Surgery) I was ready to start rebuilding my strength. I wanted to run!

My start at running was very slow - I walked a bit, ran a bit. But, pretty soon I found I was running more than I was walking, and the feeling of being able to achieve something that a few weeks ago I couldn't was intoxicating! I started trying to run further and further, and I will never forget my elation the first time I ran 10 km! I was hooked.

About a year after treatment ended I decided to try and train for a half marathon. The distances in my training plan looked overwhelming, but I persevered. In October 2010, nearly two years to that day from when I was diagnosed, I crossed the finish line of my first Half Marathon - upright, with a smile on my face!! Since then, I have run another, and am training for my third!

I am now a "runner". I love pushing myself; I love how hard work pays off. I love the accomplishment of planning my runs out, and then running them. I love the feeling of finishing a run, tired and sweaty, but done! I love that even on those days when the miles seem long and my legs feel heavy, that I can persevere and do the best I can. I love that I am out there, that I feel strong, that I am alive.

I love that even though I had cancer, it hasn't stopped me at all. I am fitter that I ever have been, fit, strong and healthy. I am what a Cancer Survivor looks like!