A Picture Says a Thousand Words...

I have had an exciting and busy day. I launched my website today!!!! www.angiepembertonphotography.com. Check it out - especially if you live in Jeff City, but I would be willing to travel, of course! : ) I am busy checking off business "to-dos" and wondering if the growing list will ever end. I have felt productive today.

In the middle of the day, I had a therapy session. My counselor commented that I seemed happy and at ease - I agreed! This is not to say there are no issues - Pa-LEASE!!!! There will always be issues, I think. This is just to say I'm feeling better about the issues. We got to talking about photography (for obvious reasons), and we were discussing looking at pictures from when I was sick. I shared that my mom often took pictures of me in the hospital or in the hotel when we were in Rochester for treatment at the Mayo Clinic. Although some might say, WHY? I have always been so thankful for these pictures. This was a part of my life, and I'm thankful mom was not afraid to document it through photography.

So, I received an assignment from my counselor: take a picture from my past each day (or every other day), and look at it, write about it, and think about how it makes me feel. I have found that looking at pictures really opens up my memory to things I thought I had forgot. 

Today's picture:

First of all, most people who look at this picture say one thing: "Oh my Gosh, that looks just like Nick!" What can I say, he looks like his mother!

This picture was taken in 1978, I believe. I was around five or six years old. I am sitting with one of my very favorite nurses, Donna....The really, really cool thing, is that I have had an opportunity to work with Donna as an adult, through the Children's Oncology Group, and I've been thrilled to stay in touch with her.

How does this picture make me feel? I feel like there are a thousand feelings rushing through me at one exact moment when I look at this picture. I am proud, happy, sad, nauseous, anxious, and scared looking at the picture. I am proud because I feel the picture really shows my strength and determination, and while I've talked a lot about not crying, not grieving my experience, I am also very proud that I was one tough cookie. I am happy when I look at the picture, mostly because Donna was there with me. As I've written previously, nurses have played a critical role in my life as supporters, mentors, and friends. I am sad when I look at the picture because I wish it wasn't so - having cancer, that is, and I feel nauseous thinking about sitting in one of those rooms, on a patient bed, getting ready to have life-saving poison run through my veins - poison that inevitably made me puke my guts up for hours on end. I am anxious and scared when I look at the picture because it reminds me of all the what ifs and unknowns in life. This happened to me. It could happen to anyone. It could happen to my son or anyone I love.

Donna and I both look vastly different today. I wonder if we are even remotely the same people we were back then. I know Donna remains committed to kids with cancer and to being the best nurse she can be. I know I am still one tough cookie! : ) One thing that I think has changed in me is that back then I often smiled because I thought it might make others around me feel better. I still do that today, but today I am so much less afraid of saying how I really feel, and for me that is AMAZING!