The Breakfast Club

Yesterday was my last day of work for a while. I'm fortunate that I've been healthy throughout my public service career and have a TON of sick days.  Like a really ridiculous amount.  So, I've listened to everyone around me from my doctor, to my therapist, to my friends and my husband, and I decided to take some serious time off to recover from surgery and radiation, and from the physical and mental effects of dealing with my cancer and Faith's cancer at the same time.  

It's strange starting sick leave while feeling physically well.  On Tuesday, I had the Molli-seed injection and yesterday morning I removed the bandage, which was a lot more like packing tape than anything I've used before (you should know that my mom called me "the bandaid queen" when I was growing up so I do know a thing or two about bandaids!). All I can say is that it was really not fun to take it off!  Underneath, there's bruising and tenderness where the injection site was but other than that I feel pretty healthy physically. 

Emotionally, it's been a bit of a tough week.  On Monday, I walked out of the building for the last time in a while and I did not expect to feel the roller coaster of emotions leaving the building where I've worked for 20 years. I mean, it is a really ugly monstrosity of a building, where 1/4 of the elevators never work, you can't drink the tap water, people heat up fish in the microwave at lunch, it's either too hot or too cold and its always under renovation  But I said goodbye to my boss and high-tailed it out of there, sunglasses on and hoping to be alone in the elevator (thankfully I was), before bursting into tears on my way out.  I know it's not because I'll miss the building or my work (which I do love) but I think it's because it is forcing me to think about myself in a different way. To see myself in a different way. We are surrounded by labels and defined by them - in government, it's about your union or your title. In social circles it's about your marital status, or whether you're working or retired or a stay-at-home parent. We define ourselves by our generation, our politics, our diets, our lifestyle choices and our health status. So leaving the building on Monday, and then logging off work yesterday with my "out of office message" activated, really felt like I was moving towards a new definition of me.  That people would see me in a new way. One that I hadn't chosen. 

So, I've been reflecting on lessons learned from people in my life including others who also belong to the Shitty Titty Committee. And I also remembered, the final scene of The Breakfast Club, where the rogue groups of teens, end their Saturday of school detention with a joint letter to the principal:

You see us as you want to see us - in the simplest terms, in the most convenient definitions.  But what we found out is that each one of us is a brain, and an athlete, and a basket case, and a princess and a criminal. 

So, while I juggle these emotions and changes, both physical and mental, as well as lifestyle changes, and what seems like a ton of medical appointments, I'm trying to be gentler with myself, lower my expectations of myself, and not try to define myself so singularly.