October is Breast Cancer Awareness month and I have been reflecting on what breast cancer has meant in my life.
A Lesson In What Matters Most
I could tell you what it took from me.
It took my breasts. It took the smooth, unscarred skin I had lived in for nearly six decades. It took months of my life and replaced them with surgeries, recovery, uncertainty, and discomfort. It changed the way I look in the mirror. It changed the way my clothes fit. It changed a body I had spent a lifetime getting to know. And yet, a year later, I find myself returning to an unexpected conclusion.
Breast cancer gave more than it took.
I would never have chosen this experience, and I certainly wouldn't wish it upon anyone else. But somewhere along the way, the things that once seemed so important began to lose their urgency, and the things that truly mattered came into sharper focus.
A Different Kind of Beauty
My body is not what it was. There are scars where there was once smooth skin, ridges where there were once breasts and there are definitely days when I wish things looked different. But I don't feel less beautiful. In some ways, I feel more beautiful because I have come to understand that beauty has so little to do with perfection. It's in the way we love, the curiosity we maintain, the joy we allow ourselves to experience, and the lives we create.
I refuse to spend the rest of my life mourning the body I used to have when there is so much living left to do in the body I have today.
What Matters Most
In my life, I have worked hard, embraced challenges, and found genuine satisfaction in my accomplishments. But after breast cancer, something shifted. I began to see my time and my priorities differently.
I realized that the most valuable parts of my life could never be measured by professional accomplishments, titles, or how much I managed to get done in a day.
The value is in the people. My children and grandchildren. My husband. My 93-year-old mother. My friends. My precious family and friends who make my life so rich.
I still believe in meaningful work, but I now understand that a full calendar and a full life are not necessarily the same thing. Let me say that again as much for myself as for you.
A full calendar and a full life are not necessarily the same thing.
Time is precious, and none of us knows how much of it we have. I want more conversations, more laughter, more ordinary afternoons together. More opportunities to be present rather than to simply be productive because when I think about the life I want to live, it isn't my accomplishments that come to mind it is the people that I love.
I know every woman's experience with breast cancer is different and I would never suggest that anyone should feel grateful for cancer or that suffering must somehow make us better. I can only tell you what this experience has meant to me. I can mourn the breasts I lost and still feel beautiful. I can wish I had never experienced cancer and still appreciate the clarity it gave me. I've learned that gratitude and grief can exist together.
Breast cancer took parts of my body, but it opened my eyes to the extraordinary life I already had—and reminded me not to miss it.
I have people to love, memories still waiting to be made, and so much life left to enjoy.
And I intend to enjoy every bit of it.
With love,
Michelle
House of LaFleur