Battle Scars

We've been hanging out in waiting rooms a lot lately. There is a lot of waiting involved in having cancer. You have to wait to find out what you have and then wait while they are treating it. It leaves you with a lot of time on your hands. I decided to catch up on my reading, something I think everyone else there does as well, because there are shelves and shelves filled with books. I bought mine at the thrift store "Chicken Soup for the Cancer Survivors Soul". I want to believe that my father will live and I want him to believe it too.

Along with the books the waiting rooms are filled with "survivors" they have visible physical signs of battle. No hair, no breasts, tracheotomies,removed limbs these are the cancer hero's that are making it one day at a time and living to tell the nubies how its done. They have lines and creases that their experiences have forever etched into their faces. But what about the soldiers whose battle scars aren't so visible?

I work in retail sales. Several weeks ago a young man in his early thirties came in to buy jeans. He wasn't sure what size or style he needed as he had recently lost a lot of weight. Now, you should know I am a "healthy" girl and am always thrilled for someone who fights the fat battle and wins so I offered my congratulations. His eyes teared up and he said, "Well, my wife died a few months ago in a car wreck and I am raising our little girls alone and I just can't seem to want to eat." I told him how sorry I was to hear that and tried to hold myself together long enough to ring up his sale and wish him well. He left and I bawled! I had no idea the pain that that young man was enduring. How many people do we meet on a daily basis that are working so hard to survive their situation and suffering with quiet dignity?

I know a lady that works at Walmart that is an incest survivor. Her father and brother both took advantage of her her whole young adult life. Her first marriage ended in divorce and she has struggled with addictions and self destructive behaviors. Now she is married with three happy, healthy children, she is a good wife and mother and a good employee who has some really bad days. She is a beautiful person and you'd never know about her battle scars unless she's been your dear friend for fifteen years.

There is a retired school secretary who lost her husband to diabetes when her boys were just babies. She worked two jobs to raise her boys. They both went to college and became professionals. One of her sons died in a motorcycle accident. Not three years later the other died in a boating accident. The day after her son died I took cookies to school for my boys. I was surprised to see her and gave her my condolences. Years later we became colleagues and as we talked about her son I asked her, " How did you come in to work that next day?" She said, " I knew if I didn't get up and come to work and do something normal, I would never get out of that bed again." Two years later my dear friend, mother of five little girls and battler of cancer, died of a brain aneurysm. The next day I got up and went to work. My eyes were swollen shut and I sequestered myself in my office but I came because I knew she was right!

These heroes have no visible scars, no one is having fund raisers or parades or having t-shirts made that say... "I survived my wife's death!", or "Incest survivor-40 years!", or "Our marriage survived infidelity, yours can too!" But all of those survivor stories are real and important and should be told....because someone needs, like I do, to believe that we can live.