A 5-year anniversary traditionally celebrates with wood, representing durable roots and growth. Today is my 5-year cancerversary. Today I get to see our tree [wood] blooming for another year.

These last 5 years have been a whirlwind of chaos. Including the original surgery I have been hospitalized 5 times for multi-night stays. I’ve received 62 butt darts to date. I now have over 10 separate providers, most of which are directly or indirectly managing cancer outcomes. Since the beginning of 2025 (1.25 years) I have had only 17 weeks with no medical appointment, test, or procedure. Many weeks there are at least 2 travels to an office, sometimes up to 4. The number of IVs, blood draws, scans, tests are way too numerous for accurate counting.

Observations I’ve made throughout this experience: I wish I had collected all the ID bracelets I acquired – I could’ve made a nice chain to decorate our home. I still can’t figure out how to put a hospital gown together and then keep it on correctly. I’m not sure why but I think they purposely make them ugly and uncomfortable. I’ve been moved all around the main hospital building many, many times but still get lost if I don’t follow signs. There are lots of different rooms and waiting required for any outpatient procedure – waiting room, prep room, recovery room, discharge room.

I keep waiting to fall into a new ‘normal’ and just settle into maintaining myself. Every time a new medical event occurs, I tell myself “Just recover from this and then go back to the ‘usual’..” Given the above, I am now grappling with the fact I will have to just keep adapting to ‘okay – this is what we are doing now’. I don’t think I get a normal other than my normal will be continued chaos.