This article was very accurate: http://www.salon.com/2012/02/20/now_what_life_after_cancer_treatment/
Here's the part that really spoke to me:
That’s why it’s bittersweet to move on to the next part. “I think there’s a huge rush of the tide to get you back as though nothing happened. To reassemble the picture that you had before,” says Anne. “People think that must be what you want, you must want to forget this. The big mistake is that it’s forgettable. Or that there’s an end to it. There’s no end to it.” And as Martha says, “The doctors will say, ‘Oh, you’re good. Go enjoy your life.’ But you don’t stop having had cancer once treatment is over.”
Cancer is part of me now. It’s part of all of us who’ve experienced it, whether we call ourselves survivors or continue to grope, as I do, for a word that makes sense of this new place. How can I call myself a “survivor” when I will spend the rest of my life monitored and tested, a veteran who knows all too well that another deployment could be as close as the next CT scan? We cancer vets live daily with our cancer — in the scars on our bodies, the memories of the people who were kind when we needed help, and the way that we can never again take for granted what a gift it is to make plans.
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