I am just the girl next door....

I am really glad that ppl are enjoying this blog. I was a bit skeptical at the beginning. Does anyone really care about what is going on in my life? Does it really make a difference? My logic was that if anyone was bored and had 5 min to kill they might take a gander. Fantastical!

I have received overwhelming response by ppl thinking that I am an inspiration or someone to be admired. To be honest, that sort of bothers me. I had a choice to make. Fight this cancer and be happy with life or wilt in misery. I did not accept that fact that I had cancer. I did not accept what was going on. I do not accept that I might not be able to have children. I DO NOT ACCEPT! This is MY life. MY RULES> MY WAY!

The irony is that this has always been my character and its only now recognized in a positive way because of the fact that I had cancer...its all good! Reality is, though, I am just the girl next door who got sick. If you didn't know me, you wouldn't acknowledge. This is how life is, until it hits close to home, most of us don't wake up. I am wide AWAKE.

I have always lived my life to the fullest. My friend and nonno died of cancer when I was 19. I saw what it did. My cancer was a blink of the eye compared to theirs. I vowed that life was about making myself happy, to be surrounded by goodness, to be remembered. I figured I would be famous and that is how ppl would know who Lisa Polito is...lol. Now i'll be remembered as the girl who survived Hodgkin's lymphoma cancer. I am not saying that it's a bad thing, but it sort of sucks.

I continued with school. I persisted for my MFA. I decided to start fundraising for the Lymphoma Foundation Canada. This is what makes me sleep at night. To know that being sick, or what I prefer to call "slightly defective" does not dictate who you are or who you become. It doesn't take over. If any of you were in my shoes, you would have done the same thing. I am just the girl next door....