Reframing the Ghosts of Fear

I am coming to the end of a year that I have measured differently. Not in seasons, but in surgeries, chemotherapy, radiation, appointments, tests, and waiting.

There were moments when fear arrived before I did. Before the surgery, fear was already in the room. Before the first chemotherapy treatment, dread had already imagined how difficult it would be.

Fear has a way of getting ahead of us. It tells us the story before we have had the chance to live it.

Yet somewhere along the way, I realized I had been preparing for this journey long before I knew I would have to make it.

For years, I have taken Pilates classes with instructors who refused to let me use age as an excuse for what my body could or could not do. It has always been easy for me to think, "Well, I am getting older. I can’t do that anymore."

They would have none of that:

“You are stronger than you think.”

“You will get through this setback.”

“Do not worry about how long it takes. Your body will decide that.”

“Believe in your body's ability to heal.”

Again and again, these women taught me to challenge the story I was telling myself. A setback did not necessarily mean decline. Difficulty did not mean defeat. Taking longer did not mean failing.

I could not have known then how much I would need those lessons.

This year, they followed me into cancer treatment.

When fear whispered, "This is going to be terrible," I learned to answer, "I will take this one step at a time."

When dread said, "You don't know if you can do this," another voice answered, "I have made it this far, I will meet what comes next."

And when I became impatient with my body, I remembered what I had been taught. Healing has its own timetable.

All those years, I thought these women were teaching me about strength, movement, and recovery. I did not know they were also teaching me how to face cancer.

And alongside their voices was another voice.

Quieter

Deeper.

The voice that has accompanied me for a lifetime.

My faith never told me that this road would be easy.  It told me I would not walk alone.

God was there in the operating room.

God was there in the infusion chair.

God was there on the radiation table.

God was there in the waiting, the weariness, the uncertainty, and is with me now in the healing.

Looking back, I am grateful for the people God placed along my path long before cancer appeared. Through the years, my Pilates instructors were teaching me more than how to move, strengthen, recover, and trust my body.

They were teaching me not to surrender to the first story fear tells.

And perhaps that is where their lessons and my faith come together.

They taught me to trust that my body was capable of more than I imagined.

My faith taught me to trust that I was held by something greater than myself.

One taught me to say, "You are stronger than you think."

The other reminded me, "You do not have to be strong alone."

Together, these truths carried me through this year.

The ghosts of fear still appeared. But I learned that I did not have to follow where they led. I could stay in the present, take the next step, give my body the time it needed, and trust that God was with me.

Perhaps that is what I will carry with me when this year of cancer care finally comes to an end.

Not the absence of fear, but a new way of answering it.

Trust your body.

Trust the journey.

And above all, trust the God who walks with you.

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