What Breast Cancer Has Taught Me About Letting Go

bidding bye-bye is hard

This is a fresh start, she said. I wept. She repeated. Slowly. With more intention.

This. Is. A. Fresh. Start.

The tears flooding my eyes blurred her simple childlike drawing.

I hope she’s better at surgery than she is at illustrations.

Fresh start. Her eyes held my watery gaze.

How the hell is amputating my breasts a fresh start?

The wisdom of her words escaped me. I was too distraught. Learning that I had cancer not only in one breast, but in both left me unable to process much. I was also in a 4% club for showing up with cancer in both boobs. Four percent. Yay me, the overachiever. Maybe I should take up the slots.

The breast surgeon is discussing where the scars will be. Your chest will be numb. We cannot spare the nipples. It is too hard to get them lined up right, she said. You could always tattoo nipples on later, she says.

I shudder, picturing Picasso-like nipples on an ironing board chest. I can’t stand even seeing cupboard doors left open, much less having askew nipples. I must restrain myself from adjusting a stranger’s tie if it is crooked. Just a little OCD, I am.

What the actual fuck?

Do-do-do-do, the theme song is playing unbidden in my head. I am in the Twilight Zone. And any minute now, Rod Serling is going to emerge in a suit and a skinny tie (mercifully on straight).

The surreal conversation with the surgeon ends. But her words on a fresh start are planted. It would take time and perspective for it to germinate.

How do you look at a double mastectomy, that’s double boobectomy in Theresa parlance, as a fresh start?

It all looks like such an ENDING. Not unlike my 32-year marriage, which had only been, a few months prior, officially dissolved.

So much loss. My trust. My home. My husband. My envisioned future. And now the grim reaper was coming for my boobs. Put that damn scythe away, mofo.

Fresh start? I still couldn’t see the wisdom. I was too awash in trauma and grief.

As my one-year surgery anniversary approaches, I can now see just what she meant.

It’s a lesson I’ve seen over and repeatedly in my work as a professional organizer and life coach.

In order to create the space you want, or the life you envision, let go. From cluttered closets to toxic relationships, the key to freedom is surrender.

You can’t reach for the future if your hands are clutched around the past.

This is always easier to see with someone else. We are shortsighted. We are too attached to the things we need to release.

And shit gets serious, really serious, when things turn malignant.

I knew my marriage was heading south long before I filed for divorce. But I couldn’t let go. If I just try harder. Get more therapy. Damn the health issues the stress was causing.

Divorcing was the mental and emotional equivalent of having my breasts removed. Both were things close to my heart that would kill me if I didn’t take action. If I didn’t let go.

I never wanted a divorce. I never wanted breast cancer.

There’s a lot of shit we get that we don’t want. And this is where we must surrender our attachment to fantasies of things going the way we want them to. And God knows media is culpable in generating expectations that are beyond our reach.

Which brings me to the next vital lesson.

Even if we could hang on in perpetuity, nothing lasts. Including our time on this planet. We are going to die.

A cancer diagnosis to brings that into a startling and crisp focus.

I’ve observed the denial of impermanence repeatedly with organizing clients. The 70-year-old retired elementary teacher in failing health who can’t release a basement full of crafting items because I might need them.

Part of me wants to shake them. You are going to die and that day is coming sooner than later. You either deal with this mess or your loved ones will have to.

But of course, I don’t speak those words. Gently and lovingly, I remind them of how good it will feel to reclaim open space. Imagine losing 500 pounds of clutter. Ahhhh, freedom! It will give them…. wait for it…. wait for it…

A Fresh Start.

And not unlike me sitting with the surgeon, tears may flow.

The invitation to a fresh start often looks like loss. And yes, it IS loss many times.

But we can’t begin again until we’ve released that which needs to be surrendered. I don’t care if it’s a packed garage or cancerous body parts. We must learn to surrender and let go when it is time. The band Kansas nailed it with Dust in the Wind:

… don’t hang on, nothing lasts forever but the earth and sky
It slips away, and all your money won’t another minute buy.

What do you need to release?

PS After sitting with the “What to do next” question, I relaunched my organizing and coaching business as Fresh Start Organizing. It just feels so right. Everyone deserves a fresh start.

Thanks so much for reading. You can find me around the internet at www.theresawinn.com, on Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram. If you’d like to support my writing in a small way, feel free to contribute to my wishlist.