Stockholm Syndrome
December 5, 2008
Tomorrow I will be having my LAST chemo treatment. It’s a major milestone: the chemo nightmare is ending, hopefully forever. I’m not looking forward to the impending side-effects (although I have stocked the freezer with calzones so I’m ready for the steroids) but there is something to be said for knowing it’s the last time. Something like, “Yaaahoo! No more chemo!!!” So why am I having this weird anxiety about the end of chemotherapy? Why am I plagued by creeping fears and nagging questions like, What if they didn’t get all the interlopers?? What if they tell me I need more chemo? And weirder still, why am I sort of relieved that I will have to keep going to the hospital for my fifteen remaining Herceptin treatments? I hate being hooked up to an IV. I hate going to the hospital. Yet now that the end of chemo is here at last, I feel strangely comforted that I still have these Herceptin treatments to take me to the hospital every three weeks for about 12 more months. Am I losing my mind? I think it comes down to the fear that if I stop going to the hospital and no one is watching the shop, the interlopers could start sneaking in and doing their dirty work again. Don’t get me wrong, I truly want this to be over so I can have my life (and hair) back. But it’s kind of like Stockholm Syndrome – I hate the way chemo has kidnapped my life, yet I’m kind of afraid to be without it.
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