Hoodie and birds in Berlin – photo by (c) howlzap Cologne
The butterflies have started early and it took me a while to realize why. There’s another cystoscopy check on Thursday but they usually start two days ahead and not seven. You’d think after a while I’d get used to it. I have in a way but somehow when you first get diagnosed you don’t think about the ongoing cystoscopies stretching out through the rest of your life. This is the eleventh and maybe one day there’ll be every six months or yearly but for now, because of the recurrence, every three.
Are they even butterflies? And why early? In the last two check-ups a new tumour was spotted. I tell myself, the recent history doesn’t make it more likely, yet there they are flying around my insides bringing dread.
What’s the best way to deal with them? I remember reading about how afraid people are of presenting and how you’re supposed to turn them around so they’re not chaotic but fly in formation. Fly for you not against you. You’re supposed to use the extra adrenaline to boost your performance. It works for me when I’m presenting but I don’t have to perform exactly. A check-up is a little different.
Meditation techniques like “noting” help. Note that they are there and then let them go. Not getting caught up in the thoughts attached to them is the trick. Let them go, let them fly and return to the breath or the present. „Don’t dwell on them. “ I tell myself and „Don’t get sucked into the what if…? questions.“ That path just leads to more stress and more stress hormones racing around my body.
There’s that mind body connection again.
Return to the breath return to the present moment.
Let them go.
Let them fly.
Put this record on repeat and focus on the positive things.
I feel well, I feel healthy, I feel tumour free.
Bladdergraffiti 