What is tough?

I'm tough.  At least I think I am.  I've gone through some really rough patches and am I'm still around to tell about it.

It's amazing how we qualify how tough someone is by what they've been through.  And is it enough to know that you are tough, or do you need other people to know it too?  It is enough to think "I've survived hell", or do we need to publicly be tougher than the next person.  Is toughness a one-uper game?

The other day at work, someone was talking about one of my coworkers who is heading in for back surgery.  They said "oh, she'll recover quickly, she a tough woman, after all, she beat cancer.  You don't beat cancer by not being tough" .  The follow up was "Yeah, none of us will ever be as tough as her, we've never faced cancer.".  Now, I don't particularly like the "tough" coworker, but in my mind, it was all about 'you don't know me, you don't know how much I've been through'.  All I said was that I thought that there were probably a lot of tough people on the staff and some people just keep their struggles to themselves.  The concensus was that nope, cancer was the number one thing that made people tough and none of us knew what it was like.

Fucking bullshit!  I just wanted to shout from the hilltops that I've been facing down a cancer diagnosis for two years now.  That I've had the possibility of cancer and hysterectomy hanging over my head every day since December 2010.  That's a long time.  Have I had to go through chemo... no, but I've been on high power drugs that have caused me to think that I"m losing my mind for over 18 months.  I've had surgeries and horrilby painful tests that nobody should have to endure.  I've been told at nearly every appointment that I should just give it all up and have a hysterectomy because it would be "easier".  I get no sympathy from doctors and most of the people around me don't get it at all.  Every day I live with the possibility that the next biopsy will reveal cancer.  Hell, last May, my biopsy was inconclusive... there were precancerous cells definitely there, but there were others they thought were likely cancerous but couldn't be 100% certain.  So for nearly a year I've been fighting off another round of cancer/precancer - but doing it silently.  I haven't shared with work (other than my boss and even then I've been quite vague).  I haven't shared with many people who know me.  I've suffered rather silently, so apparently that makes me not tough.

I've struggled for the past four years with the idea that I will never have a child.  That the one thing that I want so desperately, I will never have.  That I will disappoint my husband and never make him a father.  I deal with that pain daily.  I watch others have babies, and many have babies and not care for them or parent properly, and I feel the pain.  I get asked nearly daily why I don't have kids, or if I'm going to have kids, and I smile and say "eventually", knowing it's probably a lie... and I feel that pain.

I have been the victim of physical assault.  I have been stalked.  I have nearly lost my eyesight. I spent my highschool years being physically and emotionally bullied so badly I attempted suicide.  For ten years I was walked closely as a brain aneurysm was threatening to develop.  I've had a broken bone for over a year and need surgery but our wait times are ridiculous so I'm still waiting in pain. And now I am dealing with cancer issues coupled with infertility.

But apparently if you haven't had full blown cancer and haven't told the world about it, you're not tough.  So, there you have it, I'm not tough... but I am bulletproof!