Chemo newbie

I got the call. Everything was ready for my chemotherapy to start and I needed to get into hospital that day and being a chemo newbie I had to stay in for a few days to be monitored. I'd been building up for this, I knew this was going to happen, but now it was actually happening oh boy was I scared. This whole thing is becoming increasingly real and as much as I try and ignore it my life has changed, it's terrifying how quickly that has happened. 

So I rock up to the ward and massively felt like the new recruit, with a full face of make up on, a cheery smile and far too overdressed for a hospital stay. I was in for a shock. I was put on a cancer ward and I was the youngest in there by 50 years. I've never seen the nurses so excited about having to dust off a playstation 4.

I've never been around cancer patients, obviously I've know cancer patients and have listened to their experiences but it's not until you walk into the hospital ward, the battleground, that you see the severity of cancer. I walked into that ward and I was scared, I didn't think that this would affect me – untouchable remember. Well the ward was full of patients with no hair, attached to drips and oxygen masks. Fuck, was this my life now? Am I to become one of these patients? But what I found out over the course of my stay was that these weren't just patients, these were incredibly powerful women, amongst the drips and masks were amazing women with incredible lives and who are now inspiring friends. There are so many people out there battling and living through it, cancer has grown such a scary death connotation but it needn't be, with awareness and action it can be diagnosed early and cured, I wasn't afforded that luck, but others still can be.