Trying to find silver linings from cancer seems like the type of toxic positivity that I hate. However, this ordeal has started to help me in at least one huge way. It is helping me filter out the BS. I have very little bandwidth for anything that isn’t serving me or my family. 

I have been striving for this type of mentality most of my life, ever since realizing that my people-pleasing tendencies meant I was the last person to be happy as a result of my own actions. My son having cancer really clarifies choices as I’m making them. I’m trying not to look back on previous choices with judgement, but I can see how I could’ve gone easier on myself by prioritizing my kids and saying no to the temptation to please others. 

Now, there’s a definite and indisputable hierarchy of importance: my son’s health and treatment schedule, the emotional and physical needs of both of my kids, and the needs of my family as a unit, which covers a lot of stuff. But I spent too long trying to be too much for too many people, to the detriment of the guys in my house. 

I know I’ll still need to work on this, but keeping my family first in my mind makes saying no to other people and to stress and to things outside my control easier. It helps me keep perspective of what’s important, so I can decide not to stress about work or family drama or whatever else comes up. When I was younger, I was told I needed to “learn how to handle stress better,” but I was given absolutely no guidance as to how to do this. It felt more like an accusation than advice. Having a clear picture of priorities seems to provide the key for me. 

As always, I’m not here to tell you what to do, and maybe you already have your priorities set, but I needed a kick in the butt to figure this out. Hopefully in the future, I can figure out things like this without catastrophic life events preceding self-discovery, but at least I can make the most of this while I have it.