You know that moment when the doctor walks in and you can tell — before they even speak — that it’s not the kind of appointment where you get to exhale?
Their eyes soften, their voice lowers, and suddenly you’re bracing for the words you’ve already rehearsed hearing in your head a hundred times.
“The scan wasn’t what we hoped.”
“The treatment isn’t working.”
“It’s spreading.”
“We need to talk about next steps.”
Those words hit like a wrecking ball every single time, even when you think you’ve built the emotional armor to handle it.
You haven’t. No one ever does.
The Aftermath
The ride home is always quiet.
Sometimes I cry. Sometimes I don’t.
Sometimes I stop for a coffee I won’t finish or sit in the car long enough for the song on the radio to end three times over.
Bad news has a way of swallowing the air out of a room.
It makes the world too loud and too quiet all at once.
It’s the text from someone saying “How’d it go?” that you can’t bring yourself to answer.
It’s the way you keep replaying the doctor’s words, trying to hear some hidden silver lining you might have missed.
And it’s the guilt — because people tell you to “stay positive” or “keep fighting,” as if your sadness somehow makes the cancer stronger.
But the truth is, you can love life and still hate what’s happening to it.
Finding My Footing Again
It takes me a few days to come back to myself.
To remember that a bad scan doesn’t erase all the good that’s still here — the laughter, the love, the nights on the couch with Pete and Mojo, the people who remind me I’m more than my chart.
Sometimes hope isn’t fireworks and miracle recoveries.
Sometimes it’s just the quiet choice to keep showing up.
To keep breathing, even when it hurts.
To make another cup of coffee.
To watch the sun come up anyway.
That’s what survival looks like in between the scans.
It’s messy, and it’s human, and it’s okay.
From Mojo’s Point of View
If you ask Mojo, he doesn’t care what the scan says.
He still wants breakfast. He still wants to curl up against me and steal half the blanket.
He still believes I’m the whole world.
And honestly — some days, that’s enough to make me believe it too.
#MojoAndTheMess #StageFourButStillHere #Scanxiety #CancerChronicles #FindingTheLight
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