Calypso with a Cause - Ella – a true Warrior! The only choice we’re left with is to fight!
by Ella Coppola
It’s been 5 years, 7 surgeries with another one on the way plus endless tests and scans. No-one said it would be easy, but no-one ever said it would be this difficult either.
We all think the mere diagnosis that “you have breast cancer” is damaging, but it’s what follows thereafter that is the true trauma. What kind of breast cancer? How far along is the cancer? What will it take to survive the cancer? But all we can do is live in the moment and take it one step at a time. For me my journey has seemed endless, the true work has been in the recovery and healing! First the diagnosis, then the testing, then the double mastectomy, then the news I required chemotherapy, then the dreadful meds for another two years so I could remain in forced menopause; the worst, then the long journey of reconstruction, because I’m still young and wish to feel whole again; wear a bikini, wear a tank top, I really felt cheated and wanted back what cancer had stollen from me; my breasts back, my hair long again, my thick eyelashes again – I wanted to feel my old self again.
But no one tells you, you will never be the same again, cancer changes you, how can it not. Your body changes and as such so too does your mindset, your view on life and your take on the world. You see people differently, people see you differently, you shift your abilities, you reevaluate your needs and you think you’re the same until one day you finally accept, you’re not “that person anymore”, we suddenly must discover who we are now. It’s been a very lonely and often dark journey, it’s not easy for your loved ones to understand your pain or grasp your needs and as a mother of two, my main priority was to survive this disease, not show my pain, but instead show my children I was going to continue to show up for them every day, even if I did have 100 stitches in my body more times than I care to remember.
For me the lesson here was/is to remind myself, its ok to show our vulnerability and its ok to ask for help, even warriors feel pain. Cancer brings about hard truths, strong in mind is so important, especially when your body is weak. I had to have fat harvested from parts of my body then transferred to my chest to grow chest fat to accommodate implants, without fat, implants would just split my skin open. It constantly meant taking 2 steps forward and 5 steps back. It meant hospitalization, invasive surgeries and endless downtime, it meant stitches, constant changing of bandages, cold showers in winter, pain and above all, patience. Then, mentally forcing myself to do it over, and over again, until I could eventually have expanders inserted to gradually expand my skin to accommodate implants.
My wonderful surgeon said truthfully at the start, “it will not be without problems, it will not be without pain, you will want to give up, so you must prepare yourself”, which once again I did, and of course he was correct, I almost gave up. This part of my journey so far has taken almost 3 years and I’m still not there. The warrior in me however continues to steel herself and prepares herself to go to battle again, because all any of us can do when faced with such a diagnosis is take it one step at a time!
Choices are afforded to us in life but sometimes that option is taken away from us and the only choice we’re left with is to fight. Tears surface in my eyes and there is a tug on my heart when I think of the warriors we’ve lost to breast cancer. I am one of the lucky ones who gets to see another day. I am a survivor!