You saw me, and I loved you for that.

young adult cancer survivorship

//from Unspoken Ink Winter Session//

the pain of your exit
wells up inside me like
a hunger, a parasitic heaviness,
like the cancer that
opened my door to you.

You saw me,
not this body
wracked with pain
emaciated, person-less
my body decapitated from my soul;

You saw me.

In my darkest hour, crying, despondent
offering nothing,
Depression holding me
like a ravenous python.

You saw me.

In my fragile moments of levity
when you read Steinbeck aloud
our laughter running all the way
from our eyes down to our chins-
those precious moments
I felt alive again.
And then we’d sit silently
in just our own presence;
the world too full to talk about.

You saw me

in my year of isolation
and quarantine
from the world
in my year of isolation
and quarantine
from my Self
from joy, from any worldly contribution
You were there, you didn’t care
I was a shell of myself.

You saw me.
And I loved you for that.

I had never felt more loved
more beautiful
more wholly understood-

But something happened,
You left.

You just left.

It’s been three years
and it still
grows like a tumor in my stomach;
your absence weighing
more than I can carry some days.

I Strive

courageous survivorship

I strive to be courageous. To feel safe in my skin, to know that I am loved, and to trust that I am enough.

I strive to tell myself, “that’s not my shit,” as many times as it takes and to believe it. To know that not every battle is mine for the taking and that I will know when my time to fight has come.

I strive to tell myself, “Be Nice,” as many times as it takes. To sense when someone just needs a hug and to give as many hugs as I can.

I strive to make a change when I know a change is needed. To decide on a different path, on a different way of thinking, knowing that the cost of change is so much less than the cost of being stagnant.

I strive to spend more time in the fresh air and to do all I can to keep the air fresh. To cherish more time walking in nature with myself and less time having memorized conversations with the characters of Friends.

I strive because I am here, striving for me and striving for those who have come and gone. Knowing along the way that life is precious and not to be doled out in any which way.

I strive to feel free.

 

How would you respond to the writing prompt, of a photo of the Freedom Sculpture?

 

image via

—

This writing comes directly from one of our participants in our Unspoken Ink Creative Writing Group for young adult cancer survivors.  The participants met for 2 hours each week, for 10 weeks during our Fall 2016 session.  This writing has not been edited since its original creation, showing the wonderfully raw and powerful prose coming from the courageous writing group participants each week.  The Winter/Spring 2017 session is happening now.  If you’d like to sign up for future sessions, please email info@lacunaloft.org or sign up on our interest form.

Unspoken Ink Writing Group Winter/Spring Session Forming Now!

young adult cancer creative writing group

It’s that time of the year again!  The Unspoken Ink: Young Adult Cancer Creative Writing Group, Winter/Spring Session is now forming!  The group has changed from 10 weeks to 8 weeks but will still take you on a journey through your cancer diagnosis and into your survivorship with a small group of your young adult cancer survivor peers.

Starting March 15th, the Winter/Spring Session will meet each Wednesday for 8 weeks from 5-7 pm PT / 8-10 pm ET.

This group is designed to take you on a journey through your cancer diagnosis and into your survivorship with a small group of your young adult cancer survivor peers. Each 8-week program consists of a weekly writing session attended via video hangout. We will get to know one another in an intimate, 12-15 person setting and address issues that transport us from initial diagnosis into the new normal and survivorship.  For the Winter/Spring Session, the group will consist of 15 young adult cancer survivors and caregivers.  Sign up will close as soon as the group is full!

 

 

The Grim Reaper

grim reaper

She died. While I was on vacation, and not thinking about it, she died. I sent her a card, but I took eons to get it in the mail. I’m not sure she received it in time. Who will open the card? With the octopus, inside, promising a hug with all 8 arms. Who will sift through her things and decide whether the card is kept or tossed?

She died. I had kept such good tabs on her over the last several weeks, even installing messenger app to be able to more easily communicate with her. We texted a few times each day. When she said that things were getting bad, I started sending messages where I insisted she needn’t message back unless she wanted to. I told her that she could let me know if there was anything she needed, anything she wanted to talk about.

She died. I am living. Her cancer came back. Mine has stayed at bay. It whispers warnings on the wind, crashing the waves against the shore and rocking the boats as they travel on their way, but still it stays away. What did my cancer have that hers did not? What luck was I doled that she did not receive? What clemency did I earn in this life or another? I do not sit on these musings, I do not feel them rooted in my soul, I do not stew…but I breathe the thoughts in and out. I feel their depth and their impact. I acknowledge their power and shift them aside.

She died. She did not pass, she did not lose, she did not battle. I hope she knew that she could talk to me. That I would have listened to her think about death and dying, that I would have sat with her as she analyzed the movement from living to dying to death. I hope, that in some small way, I helped. I hope that she was surrounded by those who made her not afraid. I hope, I hope, I hope.

She died. And what does it all mean? The idea of her living on inside of me, that I am better because I knew her, even in the small fraction that I did. What does that mean? What do I do with that piece when I cannot give it back to her? When I cannot make her whole again? When I want to give it back and make her whole?

She died. Can she think, can she see, can she sense, can she breathe, can she feel the universe in a way unimaginable? I hope so. I hope, I hope, I hope.

How would you respond to the writing prompt, of a photo of the grim reaper?

—

This writing comes directly from one of our participants in our Unspoken Ink Creative Writing Group for young adult cancer survivors.  The participants meet for 2 hours each week, for 10 weeks during our Fall 2016 session.  This writing has not been edited since its original creation, showing the wonderfully raw and powerful prose coming from the courageous writing group participants each week.  If you’d like to sign up for future sessions, please email info@lacunaloft.org or sign up on our interest form.

The Categories Of Cancer People

“My period has totally stopped,” I said. “I’m worried something is wrong because of my treatments and that it means I won’t be able to get pregnant.”

“Well, you’re lucky. My bleeding is just out of control. Horrible cramps,” she responded.

Just to be clean the record, she is perfectly healthy…just complaining about her period to someone worrying about infertility. This describes my post-cancer relationship with more than one friend who pre-dates my diagnosis.

So many cannot hold the hurt and truth of others. I can’t always manage it myself, but I always try. I guess she does too…but it doesn’t always seem that way.

And so the people in my life sort themselves. There are several categories.

There are the ‘cancer happened, let’s analyze this scientifically’ crew. They launch into statistics and practice problem-solving at the drop of a hat. There are the ‘nod but say nothing’ crew, who leave you self-conscious and wondering what they were thinking through the glazed expression on their face. There are the ‘omg that reminds me of this basically irrelevant story that probably makes me less uncomfortable than the one you just told’ crew who divert the conversation into something they find more suitable while completely invalidating your feelings. There are the ‘holding’ crew, who physically or emotionally (or both) hold your hurt and your words.

The other girlfriend of mine in the room waited for our mutual friend to stop comparing my infertility concerns with her cycle’s annoyances, looked me in the eye and said, “I’m sure you’ll be a wonderful mother, however it happens.”

“Yep, She’s a holder,” I thought.

The holders are the best. They can sit in your muck, and help you dig out while still acknowledging how stinky the whole situation is.

My goal, from the second I became a caregiver and on into my cancer and my survivorship, has been to be a holder in all aspects of my life. I want to show up for people, to be brave. I want to have children and be able to do the same for them.

Some days it’s hard. I feel stuck in my own muck and cannot easily trudge through someone else’s. But some days, I can do it.

How would you respond to the writing prompt, of a photo of day by day candling of duck eggs?

duck-egg-candling

—

This writing comes directly from one of our participants in our Unspoken Ink Creative Writing Group for young adult cancer survivors.  The participants meet for 2 hours each week, for 10 weeks during our Fall 2016 session.  This writing has not been edited since its original creation, showing the wonderfully raw and powerful prose coming from the courageous writing group participants each week.  If you’d like to sign up for future sessions, please email info@lacunaloft.org or sign up on our interest form.

The Watched

This piece was written recently, during the Unspoken Ink Fall Session, by the wonderful, Amy.

I can feel them watching me, the bald one with the drawn eyes. Their glances start at my head, flicker to the uneven breasts. And then they turn away. Well, most of them do. Except for that night at the restaurant with my mother.

Hot and tired, I had taken off my scarf. My mother shook her head, gestured to the people around us as if to say: Put that back on. Stop making everyone uncomfortable.

An older woman came over to us then, smiling at my little girl. “It’s been twelve years,” she said. “And you look great.”

Paper Chain

writing group

I cleaned out my room today, getting rid of old clothes
most of which are too big for me now
as I’ve shrunk to a skeletal version of myself.
Gathering under my bed along with old chapsticks
and safety pins and crumpled receipts
were several hospital bracelets.

I’ve been saving them for over three years now,
hoping to make them mean something at the end of this-
a bracelet chain so I can count down the days
to the 5 year word:
CURE
or an art piece displaying the excessive usage of labels and
an ID number I’ll never forget: 612212
or proof for the future me that this really did happen
or a finish line I can break through–

I find them everywhere:
in drawers, coat pockets, the bottom of my purse and car
folded in my wallet
and under my bed
I have probably 200 of them

I plan to make something out of them eventually
I have a one-woman show in the works and I’ve been taking
copious notes of all the things that have happened
“ice bag boobs” after the highest fever my nurse had ever seen
“7 liters”: – my record-breaking peeing in a single day
“No, it wasn’t breast cancer, I just have really small boobs”
I don’t even need to explain that one.

There’s a lot of comedy, truly. And there’s a lot of white.
white room, white bandages
200 white stamps
200 white plastic wishes and fears
200+ white handfuls of foamed Purell

I plan to make something out of them
even if it is just a bonfire
to simultaneously burn away Cancer Girl
and offer up incense to the sky
Praise you stars, that I am still here
and I can still make things burn.

image via

Unspoken Ink: Baby Joker

writing group

This is from last week’s Unspoken Ink Writing group; unedited.  The prompt that was given was the above photo and the words, “crazy game of poker.”

And he sits there with his baby face,

smile pasted on and frozen forever like a doll in a case

with his polka dot bonnet

and flaming cheeks holding a toy just out of reach…

Death.

I often picture him as an old man wagging a grey finger

slowly lifting it to his thin mouth

and dust falling from his hairline lip with a crumbling shhh

but then he’s gone, like the Ghost of Christmas Past

the beeping machines snap into focus

and suddenly he appears again

now a toddler holding candy

The King and Queen know nothing, because the Joker

has everything in his hands

a screaming baby Death, screaming into the past present and future

and screaming his baby laugh in your face as your life goes to shit-

I think it’s wildly unfair;

to warp the tender charm of a fresh baby’s cheeks

But his eyes tell the whole thing- curved and dark

like a black hole peeping through two crescents

his little baby feet in little baby shoes

but those eyes

don’t be fooled by his games

or the toadstools at his feet

or the candy in his fists

I’ve grown to know you, the forms you take

and the many more that will follow:

a young man getting hit in the sidewalk by a mother of two running a red light

he’s in “I don’t love you anymore”

“I never loved you”

and sometimes in your own voice:

“I could never love you”

Have A Contented Weekend

This week, all of our links are meant to help you become more involved with Lacuna Loft!  Whether you’re interested in joining a program, connecting with us on social, or volunteering, there are so many different options to become a part of the Lacuna Loft team!  Don’t be shy, join us!

Here are some contented weekend links from around the interwebs…

[list type=”like”]
[list_item]join our fall writing group![/list_item]
[list_item]volunteer with Lacuna Loft![/list_item]
[list_item]connect with us on instagram![/list_item]
[list_item]join round 3 of our book club![/list_item]
[list_item]connet with us on facebook![/list_item]
[list_item]want to lead a creative workshop? Contact us![/list_item]
[list_item]share your stories with us![/list_item]
[/list]

Have a contented weekend Lacuna Lofties!  We’ll see you back after the Monday holiday!

Unspoken Ink Fall Session Forming Now!

young adult cancer creative writing group

The Fall Session of Unspoken Ink: Young Adult Cancer Creative Writing Group is forming now!  The group will meet for 2 hours each week via video chat, for 10 weeks.

Starting September 13th, the Fall Session will meet each Tuesday night from 5-7 pm PDT / 8-10 pm EDT.

This group is designed to take you on a journey through your cancer diagnosis and into your survivorship with a small group of your young adult cancer survivor peers. Each 10-week program consists of a weekly writing session attended via video hangout. We will get to know one another in an intimate, 8-10 person setting and address issues that transport us from initial diagnosis into the new normal and survivorship.  For the Fall Session, the group will consist of 10 young adult cancer survivors and caregivers.  Sign up will close as soon as the group is full!

Check out our Writing Group program page for more info!

Some quick logistics:
– The writing group meets for 2 hours each week, for a period of 10 weeks. A commitment to attend each week is important to group continuity and in creating a safe space. Please be on time ?  The Fall session group will begin Tuesday, September 13th and will meet on Tuesdays from 5-7 pm PDT / 8-10 pm EDT.
– Each participant will receive a name@LacunaLoft-writinggroup.org email address to use when attending each writing group session. At this email address, you will receive a weekly invitation to a google video hangout where the writing group session will take place.
– Following each weekly session, you may decide to submit your writing to Mallory (mallory@lacunaloft.org) for publication on LacunaLoft.org in their Young Adult Voices program section. This is encouraged but not mandatory.