As I continue to be stable and have good “head shots,” I can’t help but be grateful for every moment.  I feel an overwhelming sense of guilt anytime I feel unappreciative.  Everything I’ve experienced over the past ten years has been icing on the cake.  Now, facing forty, I have a mixture of emotions.  I feel lucky.  I feel happy.  But I also feel guilty.  Survivor guilt is difficult to explain.  It’s something that keeps you from being entirely happy that you have survived what most people thought you wouldn’t.

I’m reminded of something that one of my brain cancer friends posted years ago.  She said “nobody cares that you almost died ten years ago.”  At the time, I was just coming out of my fog of brain cancer treatment.  I didn’t understand.  Do people actually stop caring?  I didn’t think so.

Well, now I’m ten years out.  I don’t feel that nobody cares.  I think that people forget.  That’s not a bad thing.  It means we have moved on.  I think what I’ve learned is not to take people for granted.  No one is guaranteed tomorrow.  No one.

I’ve lost more friends to this horrible disease called brain cancer (mostly GBM) than I can count on both hands.  Now is my time to question “why me?”.  I never asked “why me” when I was going through this.  In a way, I’m afraid to find out why I was spared.  At the same time, I know there must be a reason.  I remember thinking the same thing when I got diagnosed.  I felt like God was trying to get my attention.  It certainly worked.  Put the fear of God into me, so to speak.  So now what?