Shining Soul

Pick a star up in the sky and pretend that star is me.

Shining bright with love for you, so all the world can see…

Yesterday I told you a bit about my life and how it feels to be a woman without breasts because they were taken due to breast cancer.  This is my 3rd foray into trying to have breasts again and I am blessed to have found such an amazing doctor who has changed my life with her dedication to women who have endured more than their share of heartache, pain and emotional/physical anguish.

I will honestly tell you that the road to the ‘new normal’ after having breast cancer and multiple surgeries (10th breast cancer related surgery scheduled for December, but #14 in my life) with one more for 2013, is not an easy road to endure.  It’s a road full of pot holes, disappointments, pain and yet triumph as well.  It’s a road that is best when shared with others ~ easier to share with those of us who have traveled it or are traveling it with you.  It’s not for the faint of heart although I am still known to faint at the sight of a needle even after all of the needles I’ve endured over the years.

It’s no different than life for everyone else for we are all on this journey together.  None of us escape heartache, pain and sorrow.  Perhaps you’ve not had breast cancer, but you’ve been shouldering an illness, abuse, depression, a different type of cancer or some other difficulty.  It may not be the same, but the choice is ~ you can endure it and keep taking baby steps forward or you can allow it to rule your life and not move forward.

It’s your choice my friends.  What I’ve learned though is that it’s a choice that I make everyday. 

I can choose to allow my situation bring me down and epitomize the victim role/attitude by feeling sorry for myself, by crawling inside and not taking the helping hands which are offered to me.  Or I can choose to rise from it and shine like a star!  I can use my experiences (there are many beyond breast cancer but that’s for another day) to help others, to be kind, to be understanding, to have patience…to help, to support and to guide by what I know and have gleamed from my own life.

Learning to love your own body is a lesson we all need to learn, breast cancer or not! 

Learning to love yourself for me is a life-long process.

As I thought about my post yesterday, I realized that I have old tapes playing in my head of not being enough and perhaps that’s why I’ve been having such a terrible time lately ~ and perhaps that’s why Dr. Phil and Oprah’s magazine struck such a chord in me yesterday.  My inner voice, you know, that inner strength broke free yesterday from the bonds that I’d imposed on it.  Today I feel freer, I feel more like the girl I love to be ~ the one that may give you TMI (Too Much Information), but will do so willingly if it helps even one other person because that’s my goal here on my blog.

If I can touch just one of you, help one other person to feel that they are not alone, that yes, I have experienced the same as you and I am still here…inspire you to keep taking baby steps…then I feel like I am living according to my divine purpose.  Because that’s why we are all here ~ to help each other on this journey of life.  Helping hands can be found everywhere.  We all have a story to tell…it’s up to you how you write your story!

Breasts or not, I am still a woman who can say she is blessed to have seen the darkness of life and has chosen to search for the light and found it! 

You can’t appreciate the stars if you’ve never endured the darkness! 

Shine on my friends!  Shine on!

xo