To me, healthy is about both body & mind. A cancer free body is a starting point, and it is quickly followed by a mind…
that *believes* that it is cancer free. I do not want to live in fear of the cancer coming back or to think with all my heart that I am going to die from this, leaving my kids and my husband and my parents and my siblings and my in laws and my friends behind.
It is OK to worry, I allow myself this indulgence from time to time, but it is important to live life and to do what you want & need to do: walk the dog, feed the kids, pay bills, read books, talk to friends and neighbors. Very happily, I have learned that the worry also fades with time. (People told me this but I couldn’t even imagine it.) I finished radiation in November 2011 and surgeries etc early in 2012. Every day, the worry fades a bit more, and the cancer is less of a focal point of my life.
When I hear of someone getting sick or of cancer coming back, it sometimes hits me that it is possible that this is not over, that once a person has cancer, it is just a matter of time before it comes back. I let these thoughts come & go. Being healthy involves taking care of the full shebang—both body & mind.