My Escape To A Happy Place …

I wear so many hats every day. Sometimes, I wonder how I do it all—how I manage to get everything accomplished. I promise I don’t do it alone. Up until this point in my life, I had been able to handle every situation that had been thrown at me. As much as I wanted to say, “I’m ready. I can handle this. I can beat this. I am strong,” this was simply too much!! It was emotional. It was scary. I couldn’t even talk about my diagnosis or the next steps. I just wasn’t ready…

Everyone close to me knows that I truly believe that in any situation, you have the right, the power and the ability to choose your experience. At this moment, I was choosing to run away from it all! I chose to escape … just for a little while anyway. I needed to laugh.  Laughter is contagious—it’s healing, and it’s good for the soul. I needed to have some fun!

Even during this dark time, light shone through in so many ways. A blessing appeared in the form of a dear friend. Years ago he introduced me to a special place as an adult where I had the time of my life... DISNEY WORLD!! It now qualifies as one of my “happy places.” It was exactly what I needed at that time. I let loose, become a big kid again and laugh—a lot! This was during the holidays, and seeing my children happy always makes me happy—especially around Christmas. Anyone who has been to Disney during the holidays knows just how amazing it is. I decided to surprise them… 

I called up a friend and said lets go to Florida and take the kids. After about ten minutes of convincing she agreed after approving the house I chose to rent. We left for the trip and had the time of our lives. A really good friend came through and made sure we had everything we needed for the trip. There was no sleeping on this getaway. We all went hard! It was all about being in the moment and enjoying life!! Everyday was a new adventure. My friend didn’t know how hard I could go. The kids had a blast. We hit the parks and rode everything possible, we did the dinner murder mystery, and even made time for some adult fun in the night-life after putting the kids to bed and leaving them with a sitter. It was the perfect escape!

I put my diagnosis out of my mind the entire trip until the last day. On that day I had to tell my friend why this trip had been so important. She was shocked and didn’t know what to say. She almost didn’t take me serious at first, but knew I would never joke about anything so serious. She asked me did the kids or my mom know and I let her know they didn’t. I told her I had to get ready to get back to the real world because my Doctor appointments would start back as soon as we returned for the new year.

My trip had come to an end. Time to leave my happy place and go back home to put back on the vest with the ‘S’ on my chest. I was ready! At least that’s what I told myself. It was time to be strong and face this thing head on. I prayed for strength and I prayed for courage. I also knew I could not fight this alone. It was time to tell my friends (my angels) who would be there for me every step of the way….but First, I had my first appointment with the plastic surgeon…
(to be continued…)