When this whole process started, I heard several times something along the lines of, "it's a year out of your life," or "this will take everything you have for a year, but you'll make it." These comments always reminded me of being down in the Pit of Despair, hooked up to "the machine" and having a year of my life "sucked away," Princess Bride Style. Well, a year is bad enough, but people lied to me! 52 weekly doses of Herceptin, not able to be administered for 3 months with FEC, plus extra time for weeks of low WBC counts and recovering from surgeries......a "year" has turned into an actual 16 total months until I'm officially cancer-free. Even with the extra time and added set backs to the originally assumed time frame, I am so grateful to have made it to this point in the process. It's almost as if I'm just coasting now, especially when compared to some of the steps of treatment last year. I've made it through the steep and rocky paths and now just have to endure to the end.
As my nurse was hooking me up today, she commented on how close I am to being finished. "You're going to miss us! You won't miss coming here, but you'll miss us. You'll finally have your life back." I will miss them! I'll miss having that place I go where everybody knows my name and their job is to make me well. I'll miss the forced naps. I'll miss the legitimate medical excuses for being too fat. I'll miss the reflection time and testimony-building experiences. I'll miss the feeling of added blessings that come from relying on The Lord during the storms. Yes, I will miss many things, but I am ready to have my life back.
Soon this will just be another one of life's experiences. People will be sick of me talking about it and relating everything to cancer. I will have my life back and will be able to live without this cloud of cancer trying to block out the light. I will probably always have scars--both physical and mental--remnants of my battle with cancer, but scars are evidence of experiences, and they will serve as a reminder of what I have to look forward to and not just what has been lost.
This has been one of many storms in my life. I've had many other challenging experiences to overcome, and I am sure that there will be many more in the years to come. I thought I had learned about patience, humility, charity, and understanding the Lord's timing over and over again. However, this storm has been a big one. Similarly, as I speak with others about their own personal trials, I am coming more and more to believe that each one of us will--at least at one point in our lifes---experience something that truly brings us to our knees. There is going to be some trial, some loss, some grief, some experience with children, some loneliness, some depression, some illness, some frustration, some major life storm that will shake us to the core, compel us to be humble, and create within us new understanding of conversion and concentrating on what is truly important.
So much of life is inconsequential, "treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where theives break through and steal." {matt. 6:19} I truly believe that God wants to bless us and allow us to prosper, but so much of whether these "treasures" become a blessing or a curse lies in perspective and attitude. Does pride take over and we forget to be grateful? Do we get so wrapped up in the busyness of life that we forget to nourish personal testimony and strengthen family? We are told to "lay up....treasures in heaven," to "seek...first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you." {matt 6:20, 33} At some point--and perhaps over and over again--we must learn how to balance this earthly life with the eternal, and often the storms of life help shift our perspective.
God's timing is not our timing, for we are bound by mortality, and He is eternal. Science cannot completely explain it. The math does not add up. When we are in the most terrible storms and at the weakest points, we can often become the strongest. When trials and sorrows would seek to overtake us, having faith and relying on the Savior will add up to more strength than we ever knew was possible. The time that seems to tick slowly by can become but a blink. The windows of heaven are opened up, and blessings are poured out. And even when some of life's trials are not removed from our lives, we become changed, strong enough to withstand the strongest of storms, for as long as it takes, all through learning faith and leaning on The Lord, whether for a year, for 16 months, or until the end. "For with God all things are possible." {mark 10:27} 
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