Nope, that's not me

To a lot of people, my cancer hits hard because of what already happened to my mom.  I admit, when the doctor told me the biopsy came back malignant, I couldn't stop thinking about my mom.  I cried out, "This is what killed my mother.  It's coming for me?"  She battled breast cancer for five years and she lost.  For some, my cancer just brings back memories of what happened to her.

I'm not my mother, though.  I look like her and have been told I walk and talk like her (not unheard of - a lot of daughters resemble their mothers).  My cancer is not history repeating itself.  It's genetics - simple as that.  I'm five years younger than what she was when she was diagnosed.  I'm not married with three young kids.  Also - I'm Lara, not Pat.  Hi, nice to meet you.  I'll say it again in case anyone needs reassurance: I am not my mother.

I used to be scared of the very thing that's happening to me right now.  Many times I cried because I knew that breast cancer was coming for me.  I knew it, I knew it, I knew it.  Guess what - breast cancer has come for me.  All those years I was scared that I was going to end up just like my mother and die of breast cancer are in the past.  Poof - gone like Kaiser Soze.  I have breast cancer and what happened to her isn't causing me fear anymore.  It's giving me motivation.  I want to beat this so I can say, "IN YOUR FACE CANCER."  I don't know who I would say that to.... the sky?  I'll figure something out, maybe draw a pair of murderous boobs.

She has been with me every step of the way and will continue to be.  I can feel her presence and I know she's watching out for me.  I had the nurses show a picture of her and my dad when they were dating to me (it's a great picture of my mom - she was actually smiling!) right before I went under the knife.  I wanted that to be the last thing I saw before my first surgery: my smiling parents.  I was one of her motivators while she was battling breast cancer.  Now she's mine.