The Battle We Didn't Choose

My Wife's Battle with Breast Cancer

A heartbreaking, touching record from a bereaved husband.

http://mywifesfightwithbreastcancer.com/

Yes they always say 'choose your battles wisely', but it's hard to come to terms with being forced to engage in a battle that you didn't choose, a path you didn't want to tread, a cause you'd rather not be involved in personally, vocabulary that you'd prefer that hadn't had to learn, going to places you never thought you'd go to, doing things you never thought you'd do, feeling things you've never felt before, saying words that you never thought you'd have to say, living with things that you never thought possible.

It's hard to understand why this battle has chosen you and why you have to follow this road - not in a 'poor me, it's not fair' type of way, (although there have been those moments of feeling very sorry for myself I admit) but a genuine puzzlement about why this has come, searching desparately for a meaning and a purpose in it all, grappling with it all, wanting to know why you've been forced to open that door.

I try not to think about this too much because I don't think there is an answer and I think in pursuing this line of thought, there lies only guilt, sadness, chlchés and madness.   If pushed I think the answer is that which was given to me by my Swedish friend Anna when we were struggling with terminating our first pregnancy because the baby would have been very ill.  She said in a very loving way, 'stop searching Claire, you'll never find an answer, all you need to know is 'Shit Happens'.

That's the only answer I can find.

“To the dumb question "Why me?" the cosmos barely bothers to return the reply: why not?”
― Christopher Hitchens, Mortality