My #cancer story 🌊⛈⚡🌈❤
(At the end, a very important message)

It was early July when I visited my childhood friend that had just started chemotherapy…
A few days later I was diagnosed with breast cancer. I went silent on social media from that day on. Today I completed all the chemotherapies…and the tumor has disappeared!!!🕊 A Victory day. I gather little and big victories. Today is a BIG one and I am sharing it. My friend is also doing well 🥰
I do have surgery and other types of therapies coming up but the toughest part is over🙏🏽

Once the news of my breast cancer broke in I hesitated: Which doctor to go with, private or public (I had breast exemption on my private insurance 🤨), to make appointments and do many exams as fast as I could. I used to think and say “I am growing wings” – I was literally flying from one clinic to another

And then questions like: shall I tell the truth to my 9 year old son? my hair will fall, he will notice. Can I pretend as if nothing happened and at what cost?

How will I bear to see my image changed while looking at the mirror, what about the other people’s gazes, shall I wear a wig? shave my head? a scarf maybe?

Or?
Shall I continue working? Do I stop seeing my #arttherapy patients? Will I be able to hold space for them? How will they feel?

And after each chemotherapy when the symptoms kicked in, will I make it? How long will it last? how do I deal with the pain in my body? Do I combine it with other therapies? acupuncture? Chinese medicine? Some CBD cannabis oil? Epsom Salts? Oxygen therapy?

Or?
how to accept the abrupt stop of the menstruation? Will it ever come back? and these symptoms of feeling cold and then suddenly so hot? How can I help my body heal?

and many more questions…

I did make my decisions on how to go through all these dilemmas. Some of the answers are reflected in the pictures. There is no right or wrong. Each one lives the answers to these questions how they prefer and need.

In such a short time where life and death feel near there is a subconscious cleaning process.
I mean, the unnecessary things are left out and one prioritizes or at least tries to keep the essential. My essentials are my beautiful son, my dear family and dear friends in Greece and overseas, my dog Rex🐩 Nature🌿 Art 🎨 Art therapy🖌A movie and/or play 🎭 Traveling the world 🌍 Reading 📚 Writing 🎼Music

However the most important question to me at this point in life is:⁉Can I be into life embracing its light and dark moments? Can sadness and joy, hope and pain coexist ⁉

And, can I love ❤ my body and myself inside it, no matter its shape, gender, health & emotional state, relationship status, colour, socioeconomic circumstance, in order to heal?

Can we?

I say to my 9 year old son
“Real beauty lives inside us” 🌄

Χριστίνα Μοσχάκη 🕊

P.S My #breastcancer was not found by mammography. Only ultrasound detected it. Some doctors forget that essential detail. We need both exams ⚠