Writers Block

I've been staring at this blank screen for a half an hour. I could just click the red x in the corner of the screen, close the page and not blog but I feel like there's something I need to say. I just don't know what it is yet.

Tomorrow I go for the second part of my breast reconstruction surgery. This is the one in which they take out the expander that was put in in July and replace it with an implant. They will also reduce and give lefty a little lift to make me a little more symmetrical.

This is the final to being normal. As of now I've decided to not have a nipple reconstruction. I don't really see the need. I might change my mind later but for now, I'm good to be a Cyclops.

I'm going to be off work for 9 weeks. I have a very physical job and the muscles I use in it are the very same ones that will be healing. And there's the mental healing as well.

It's estimated that only 10-20% of women in Canada have a reconstruction surgery after mastectomy. I can't speak to other women's choices on this but I did it because I wanted to feel whole again. To look at me with clothes on, when wearing my prosthetic you'd never know I only had one breast. But I knew.

There is nothing I love more than taking my bra off when I get home from work. But to have that lopsided feeling. To not feel comfortable, even in my own house. To not feel comfortable in my own skin.....I hated that. I beat cancer but it was still beating me by tearing down my self esteem.

And my self esteem is at an all time low. I am not losing weight, in fact I'm still gaining. I don't feel attractive. I don't feel like me. I want to feel like me again and I'm hoping that finishing the surgery will help me get there.

I remember back when I had the expander put in and I was in severe pain and felt like I was wasting the kids summer and I questioned why I did it. I thought I should have left well enough alone.

I know now that that was just the pain talking and I also know that I feel 100 times better than I did before the surgery. I'm looking forward to wearing a normal bathing suit, one in which my prosthetic doesn't float up over top of my bathing suit. I love that when I buy a shirt I don't have to worry about if it shows cleavage because once again I have cleavage to show! I also can't wait to buy new bras. And because my size will be a bit reduced I should be able to buy some really pretty ones from Victoria's Secret.

And yet I still feel like I'm missing something. I feel like part of me lost. But I don't know what.