Hello angst, my old friend

When I was 15 I got my learner's permit and started learning to drive. I had always loved the idea of driving, not just because it represented freedom and adulthood, but because it just seemed like fun. I remember asking my mom if driving was fun - she'd said "Yes! It IS fun," as if she'd never really thought about it before but, as a matter of fact, did find it lots and lots of fun and was surprised at just how much fun she thought it was.

I liked driving right away. I was pretty good at it, I've always had decent coordination which I attribute to my parents putting me into every childhood activity from swimming to soccer to dance to softball, to acting. And I am very rule-oriented. Which is not to say that I always follow the rules. Actually, I tend to break them quite a bit, but only after drawn-out calculated cost/benefit analyses and deliberation. I need to start off knowing what the rules are, and why. And then I will decide if they are good rules. If they are, I follow them. If they're not (and if breaking them won't cost me a fine or jail time), I may not follow them. I don't know who in the f-- I think I am, breaking rules to and fro, but that's how I roll. And actually, I'm too much of a goody-goody to break that many...or the really important ones.

Anyway, back to my story. I wasn't a wild child in high school, but I wasn't a saint either. I had a fling with an older guy who had a live-in girlfriend, I had a drink or two on the remote occasion that alcohol was made available to me. I did some, uh....other things....you know what I mean. But I noticed about myself that the closer and closer I got to getting my actual driver license (that sounds wrong, right? But that's what it's called - a "driver license"), the better and better behaved and more and more paranoid I became.

I started to worry about every rule I had ever broken and every instance of non-sainthood throughout my life and wondered if it would come back to haunt me in the form of a denied application to drive. I drove like an android. Perfectly. And did everything else perfectly. The closer I got to attaining that license, the more I realized I had to lose. And the more stressed out I got about it. The more I fixated and obsessed about how I had to be perfect from here on out and how, if I got my license, I would never, ever break another rule.

This became a pattern in my life. Maybe it's just human nature. The same thing happened as I got closer to the bar. I'd lose sleep over parking tickets - would they still let me be a lawyer? I took extra effort to pay my bills on time, I wouldn't sign any petitions for fear of my name appearing somewhere it shouldn't, I slowed down for yellow lights, I was totally irrational about it. I was saintly. Because I was so afraid of losing the chance to attain all that I had worked for.

I do have a point to all these stories of neuroses. I am feeling paranoid again. I am feeling echos of these adolescent debilitating worries. The closer I get to finishing The Wait, the more I fear a positive beta. I know this is silly - I remind myself of that constantly. Especially having just heard from the oncologist that there is no greater risk of recurrence now than at any point in the future. But on some level, I don't know if I believe that. GTD is a cancer, and most cancers follow at least one pattern. Which is that recurrence typically happens sooner, rather than later, after remission, if at all.

The only other reason I can think of for this paranoia is that: if it's not one thing, it's another. That's how it is with me. I don't think any amount of therapy could fix that. I will always find something to worry about. My inborn pessimism makes me a good lawyer. And now that I don't have to fixate on an unbearably and unfoundedly long wait, I am now latching onto the fear that the shorter wait is too good to be true. I imagine that if I get through The Wait as planned, I will then worry that I won't get PG soon enough. If I do get PG, well, we all know the myriad of worries that will ensue. One of my new-mom friends who knows the details of my situation told me today "Astrid, once you have the kid, then you will know what real worry is." She said it in the context of she couldn't wait for me to have my baby, to look into its face. She's been pretty awesome, if a bit insensitive (how can a person help it if they've never been touched by IF), throughout this process so I know she meant it well. But it was one of those moments in which I instantly thought she has NO idea. NO idea what worry is. Not only did I worry for my baby, it was founded. The worst did happen. And then the worser happened and I was diagnosed with a form of cancer. To think that I don't know what real worry is. Even in my most pessimistic doomsayer moments I could never have conceived of how bad it would actually get for me. I thought I was worried about my pregnancy. And then I learned that there was plenty more to be worried about. Like my life and my ability to have a child. What a stupid suggestion - that I don't yet know what real worry is because I've never had a kid. That I will suddenly 'wake up' to real fear once it arrives. I have no doubt that having a child is a new level of being on every level imaginable. But I am prepared to properly worry about and appreciate my baby in a way that she never will be (god willing).

So I guess the point of all of this is just to document that the good news of this week from my oncologist hasn't freed me of worry, that I am following a pattern, but that I am ready for and appreciative of the steps I have yet to make towards becoming a parent.