The dust is beginning to settle

This has been a year unlike any other in my ENTIRE life. We moved to CO in January, I felt sick almost from that point until we discovered the mold. I continued to feel really sick, then the cancer diagnosis! It's almost unreal. But thankfully, the dust is slowly beginning to settle, though we still have much to learn and many decisions to make regarding treatment.

I will be contributing to this blog, my feelings, experiences as well as what I'm up to in terms of treatment, progress, etc. It's quite an unusual experience to be making decisions where your own mortality is such a factor and openly discussed.

In a way, it's been good. My priorities quickly got aligned to how they should be, God first, family and people next. And there are many things that sometimes I cared too much about in the world, that instantly became totally unimportant.

As you can imagine, the initial news is a shock, a gut punch, and hard to process. We are still understanding the full picture and each time we learn more, I feel another punch or two. But, as the dust is settling, context is slowly returning to my life. Sure, it's not like I have a twisted ankle or an ear infection. Cancer is no joke. But think about the miraculous way our body keeps us going each day. Even my body right now, heart beating, brain functioning, breathing, vision, hearing, and my liver riddled with tumors and still working. My body has done that for 47 years and hopefully it'll keep doing it for a long time still. This current health hurdle, though big, is just one part.

A few phrases you won't be hearing me say.

"I'm fighting cancer."

"My cancer."

"I'm a cancer survivor."

Cancer won't be my identity, just like you would never identify yourself by a hangnail on your pinky toe. I'm still just Shane, Alicia's husband, son of God who currently has some "nasty buggers" in my body that I'm working to get rid of.