The Day I Realized I Was Finally Okay

What happens when the place that saved your life becomes the trigger for your deepest trauma? Standing in the parking lot of my cancer center, just a mile from my home, my body betrays me with each visit—racing heart, metallic taste, nausea—physical reminders of the chemotherapy, radiation, and countless needle sticks that occurred within those walls.

For three years following my breast cancer diagnosis, these "cancer days" dragged me into a predictable spiral of anxiety, depression, and isolation. Until suddenly, they didn't. After 40 months, something shifted unexpectedly after a family vacation. Walking into my oncology appointment without the usual meltdown, completing my checkup without anxiety, and—most surprisingly—returning to work instead of collapsing on the couch with junk food and reality TV. The realization was profound: I could finally say "I'm okay" and truly mean it.

The unspoken truth of survivorship is that there's no guidebook for rebuilding your life after cancer treatment ends. Society expects you to feel grateful, energetic, and "back to normal" when everything about your reality has transformed. You're supposed to trust a body that betrayed you, feel healthy while managing medication side effects, and confidently discuss your experience when you're still processing the trauma. These impossible expectations only deepen the isolation. My journey revealed three essential elements for moving forward: a meaningful goal (climbing Mount Kilimanjaro), finding community with others who understand, and developing the grit necessary to face an uncertain future. Whether you're navigating cancer or another life-altering challenge, these principles—goal, group, and grit—offer a framework for finding your way when there is no map. Join me every Tuesday morning as we explore what it truly means to build a life after cancer.

Chapters

• 0:00 Cancer Center Trauma Response
• 2:37 Unexpected Change After Vacation
• 4:37 What You're "Supposed" To Feel
• 6:26 Goal, Group, Grit: The Path Forward
• 8:05 Podcast Introduction and Purpose

Transcript

Speaker 0: 0:30

I live about a mile from my cancer center. The sterile place where they've stuck needles in my body, pumped me full of chemotherapy and radiated my chest. While my medical team is great, just driving past this place makes my heart beat faster. I get a metallic taste in the back of my throat, I feel lightheaded and queasy, and my body reacts to the sight of this building in a deeply uncomfortable way. So while this place is on a busy street, I avoid driving down it because I can't stomach the thought of even seeing the building where some of my most traumatic memories have occurred. So naturally, every three months when I go into this building for a checkup with my oncology team, it affects me deeply. I don't sleep well. The night before my appointment. I have to take deep breaths in the parking lot before I go into the building. I used to distract myself by taking a selfie of my hair growth after chemo, and that seemed to help, but only a little. If I show up for my appointment and they put me in a chemo infusion room for my lab draw, I feel nauseous and like I'm going to throw up. I call these days cancer days days when I have to visit my oncology team, and my family knows that cancer days send me into a deep depression. Usually on a cancer day, I go to my appointment and then I lay on the couch for the rest of the day eating junk food, feeling sorry for myself and watching trash TV. Going to the cancer center is like ripping a scab off of a healing wound. It starts gushing blood, the scar gets deeper and deeper and the wound doesn't heal. I thought that right after I finished cancer treatment, everything would be great and good and I'd be able to bounce back to my happy, optimistic self, but that hasn't been the case. However, something odd happened recently. I just returned from vacation with my family. The day after we got back was a cancer day. So we get back from vacation. I'm feeling pretty good and feeling pretty relaxed.

Speaker 0: 2:44

I went to bed early the night before my appointment just because I was tired from traveling. I slept well. I woke up and instead of freaking out, I went on a nice long walk. I did a little bit of yoga, I dropped my kids off at school and then I went to the cancer center. I didn't have a meltdown in the parking lot. I was calm walking into the building. I didn't feel queasy during my blood draw. I wasn't tense during my breast exam and I was able to honestly share how I was feeling with my doctor.

Speaker 0: 3:17

Now, after the appointment, I ran some errands, I came home and I went right to work. I just continued on like it was a normal day, not a cancer day. It was so bizarre. When my husband came home for lunch he asked how I was feeling and he was shocked because I was up in my office working. I wasn't laying on the couch watching TV and I said I think I'm okay. It was kind of like in the movie Home Alone, when Kevin McAllister's in the basement and the radiator's making noise and he's like I'm not scared anymore. That's a little bit how I felt and here's what I learned from this experience. At the cancer center just a few weeks ago, it's been 40 months since I was diagnosed with cancer. It has taken me over three years to be able to say the words I'm okay and really mean it.

Speaker 0: 4:07

There isn't a how to build your life after cancer book. You're supposed to feel normal, but you still feel sick. You're supposed to smile, but you still feel like crying. You're supposed to be happy that you survived, but you're wondering why You're supposed to trust your body, but it just tried to kill you. You're supposed to have energy, but your body feels a new type of exhaustion that you can't even explain. You're supposed to believe in your doctors, but they don't know what you're going through. You're supposed to accept and love your new body, but you feel like it's ugly, fat and stupid. You're supposed to feel calm because the hard part is over, but you're still freaking out. You're supposed to feel healthy, but the drugs you take every day to prevent recurrence make you feel sick. You're supposed to be in control of your thoughts, feelings and emotions, but you've never felt more out of control in your entire life. You're supposed to go back to work and expect it to be the same, but it isn't. You're supposed to be able to talk about cancer like you're an amazing survivor, but you choke on the words and you lie about how you're doing or how you're feeling, or you avoid talking about cancer altogether. You're supposed to be brave, but you're still scared. You're supposed to be like yay, it's breast cancer awareness month, but you want to boycott every single brand who exploits a pink ribbon and cancer stories for sales. You're supposed to pick your life up where you left off before your diagnosis, but you're lost in the wilderness, without a compass to show you what direction to go.

Speaker 0: 5:36

I thought I'd be okay after cancer but I wasn't. And if you're someone who just had a cancer diagnosis, just had a cancer scare if you're someone who is in cancer treatment right now, or maybe you've gone through cancer treatment and you're feeling like what just happened in my life, I'm there with you and sometimes I think that for me, cancer was that horrific, traumatic event that happened. But maybe you haven't had cancer or you haven't been through a cancer experience. Maybe you've been through something else. Well, maybe we can talk about it. I'm going to put everything in this podcast into the cancer context, just because that has been that significant event in my life. Maybe we can just figure out how to navigate all of this stuff together If we haven't met before.

Speaker 0: 6:30

My name's Rebecca. I am a woman who experienced breast cancer. I'm a wife. I'm a mom. I'm an army veteran. I'm a backcountry guide. I'm a ski instructor.

Speaker 0: 6:41

This is my new project a place to share stories about three things that have helped me cope with life after cancer. Having a goal the goal to climb Mount Kilimanjaro we're going to talk about that later. Finding a group, a community of like-minded people who have experienced cancer, recognizing that, as someone who's had cancer, the future is always so uncertain. And needing to lead a gritty life to build that resilience to cope with whatever the future brings. Goal group grit those are three things that can help anyone get through difficult times, cancer or not. Anyway, welcome to the podcast. I hope you'll join me here on your favorite podcast app every single Tuesday morning, where I share a story about cancer and what I learned from it. And, if you prefer to watch something like this on YouTube, this exact same podcast will drop on YouTube every single Friday. Now, I'm not a doctor, I'm not a therapist, I'm not a life coach, but I'm, like you, just another human on this big ball orbiting the galaxy. Welcome to a podcast all about life after cancer.