Cancer in COVID Times
- Surviving Breast Cancer
- 8 hours ago
- 2 min read
By Jill Rackham COMMUNITY | POETRY
Cancer has given me another reason to remember the year twenty-twenty.
When the world was told to stay at home, I was having hospital visits aplenty.
Rules stated I had to attend lots of appointments on my own so my husband waited outside.
Although the staff were always lovely, waves of emotion overcame me just like a tide.
Mammograms, an MRI scan, ultrasounds and biopsies all happened so fast.
Followed by surgery, monthly injections and infusions – I wondered how long my frequent hospital trips would last.
It was so hard to keep walking through the hospital doors for each of these on my own.
Having cancer in times of COVID meant so much suddenly became unknown.
Several days before each surgery, in the hospital car park, a COVID swab was taken.
Then I had to isolate, thankfully the result was always negative, so surgery was never forsaken.
Days in hospital recovering from surgery and dealing with my thoughts, all felt so long.
Not being able to have loved ones near to give me much needed support, did feel so very wrong.
The surgeon would come to see me to explain how proceedings had gone.
In the haze of anaesthetic it was hard to take information in, but I wouldn’t have been the only one...
Life is now as we knew it before COVID came along with rules no longer in place.
It feels unbelievable as I reflect, about all the changes we had to face.
COVID definitely added to the intensity of this trauma of mine.
I had to be braver and more resilient than I had in life at any other time!
Thankfully for anyone starting this awful journey now.
COVID’s impact I hope will not feel as big somehow.
