Not Outgrowing Christmas

(Or my favorite time of the year)

This is my favorite week of the year. The stretch between the end and the beginning, when productivity expectations drop, calories rise, and the world seems to slow down enough to welcome naps.

I missed this week last year.

On this day a year ago, I was receiving what I did not yet know would be my final round of combination immunotherapy. The plan had been four rounds. I got fewer.

Cancer has a way of not sticking to the plan.

That last treatment left me with some permanent changes, including adrenal insufficiency. My body no longer produces cortisol, the hormone that helps regulate stress.

I explained it to a cousin I love like this:
“If I experience sudden, extreme stress, my body may not be able to respond. Things could get dangerous quickly.”

She paused, then said, “You might be the worst person in the world to have that condition.”

She was not wrong.

The person she had known since I was nine was a chronic worrier. The version of me she spoke to last January was still that person.

But I am not her now.

I still worry, of course. Just not constantly. Not compulsively. Not the way I once did when worry felt like my default setting, or maybe my identity.

Tonight, my kid is upstairs. One of Todd’s kids is home from work. Three big dogs are asleep on the couch. The pellet stove hums in the next room while I sit here typing.

I don’t believe I left behind the woman and the girl I was.
The verb I choose is outgrew.

I outgrew who I was.
And I am still growing into who I am.

Last year, on this day, I was grateful that my best friend could make me laugh during treatment by saying, “At least you’re not pregnant.”

She knew something about me that very few people do. In high school, I was terrified I might be pregnant, even though I had not yet had sex. Fear has always had a loud voice in my life.

Perhaps now you understand why my cousin was so alarmed to learn that stress could actually kill me.

But when my body made the choice unavoidable, when it became life or stress, I chose life.

I chose the couch.
The dogs.
The kids in different rooms.
The warmth.
The quiet.
The sugar.

I love this week because it reminds me how to live this way. Slowly. Imperfectly. Surrounded by chaos and comfort, maybe not in equal measure, but certainly within the same beat.

This year, I am not missing it.

I’m also NOT missing a chance to show off my dogs and their Christmas Best.