When will it get easier

Manc - I'm sorry to read of your struggle. I can't tell you when the fear of recurrence will dissipate for you. I had a mammogram of my healthy breast 12 months after diagnosis and didn't think twice; 24 months after diagnosis, despite knowing deep down inside it would be fine, I looked for the results every day until they came in - benign.

When I was going through treatment and bald (hard to hide that in the YMCA locker room) two women I knew spoke to me of their own cancer. Realize, these were women I "knew" because we had been in the locker room at the same time for years - I only knew the first name of one! The message was, in addition to support and encouragement, that they had long since moved beyond the fear. Both were 10 or more years past breast cancer and could barely recount any details of treatment. Both were probably your age or younger at diagnosis. I received a similar messages from my next door neighbor and a woman at church.

My only advice is to take it one day at time. I know it sounds trite but it is an approach. Know that your family it there for you and as the good mother you seem to be, your job as a parent includes raising your children to be productive and self-sufficient human beings. My children rose to challenge of supporting not one but two parents with cancer over the past three years.

Manc,

Runcrb said it very well.

It's been a few years for me, it gets easier, but I have to tell you, yesterday it suddenly got much easier. See, I got trapped in a small closet, don't ask me how, I was convinced I'd find a way out, but after a few hours in there, I was running out of ideas, and beginning to have difficulty breathing. I banged and I screamed, but there was nobody around, it being a weekend. I began to consider that I might die there.

Somehow, eventually someone heard me very faintly, but they had no idea where the sounds came from, and kept trying all the wrong places. It was still quite a while till they went in the right direction and found me.

During my time of wondering whether I'd ever see sky and trees and people I love ever again, I saw that I had taken a whole lot of things for granted, and that if I ever got out of that box alive, I would love and appreciate and behold every minute of existence, even if it was my last minute.

I'm waxing a bit rhetorical here, but it is how I felt, and still do, and I can only wish the telling of this small incident might help even one person love their life more, and worry less.

Manc, give yourself some time. It takes a while. You will find that, soon, it won't be at the forefront of your mind and you will probably only get anxious at appts, etc., but will be able to move forward. Unfortunately, our medical teams don't usually address the mental and emotional aspects of the DX and we are left to fend for ourselves. Thank God for this forum!:) If you need professional help, by all means, seek it out. Best wishes to all.