On Perspective

My perspective isn't right, isn't for everyone, isn't better than yours.  It's my perspective.  It has changed and evolved more in the past 6 months in a way most will never know.  And it's so simple.  At the end of the day I just want to be a mom to my son, a wife to my husband, a daughter to my parents, a sister, a friend.  I want to bring more joy and happiness than I take, I want to give more than I receive.  And I want to grow old in these ways, very old.  Everything else is secondary.  

As I continue to grow in my faith and religion I find myself at an interesting and difficult juncture.  I am faithful, I believe.  However I can't just openly trust in God's will because what if his will isn't for me to beat this.  I don't know His will for me, His plan for me and I'm not willing to accept anything less than me beating this.  So therein lies the challenge.  I voiced this struggle at church this past week and a good friend simply stated to me that we still have some power to influence our outcome.  We have some control.  And as a control freak, that was just what I needed to hear.  Cancer seeks to take control away.  And I think some let it.  I won't.  When I pray I pray for strength and grace and endurance.  To beat this, not to live with it, but to beat it.

On Memorial Day, 30 minutes in to a grueling workout named Murph, to honor the sacrifice of both one and many, I found myself in this exact same spot of blind faith and control.  Of accepting my circumstances and fighting to change them.  Laying face down on the floor, resting between push ups, the tears starting flowing.  Body shaking, ugly face crying tears.  Not because I couldn't do the workout, couldn't finish it, but because I could and I would.  Because in that very moment I felt this overwhelming, clear as day thought wash over me.  If I can do this I won't die from cancer.  If I can run 1 mile, do 100 pullups, 200 push-ups and 300 squats, then run another mile AFTER starting back on chemo and radiation then I will also beat cancer. 

As I laid there in a pool of my own sweat, after having asked a dear friend if my eyebrows were running, crying, I heard one thing: Come on Brit, you can do this.  So I did.