The In-Between After Cancer: Learning to Navigate Feeling Lost

I had to sit down and write today—because there’s no other way to hold all of this.

This morning looked like every other morning.

The alarm went off.

I got the kids ready.

I dropped Pay Pay off at daycare.

Parker and I drove to the hospital and parked in the same exact spot we’ve parked in for every visit—like muscle memory at this point. Like a routine we never asked for, but learned to live inside.

Everything about it felt normal.

And yet… nothing about today was normal.

Today feels heavy in a way I can’t quite explain. The emotions aren’t simple—they’re layered, tangled, crashing into each other all at once. I feel happiness so big it almost scares me. I feel anger that hasn’t gone away. I feel relief, disbelief, loneliness… and underneath all of it, this quiet, disorienting feeling of being completely lost.

Because today was supposed to be Parker’s last doctor’s appointment during cancer treatment.

Last.

People say that word like it comes with closure. Like it answers something.

But it doesn’t.

They ask, “What’s next?”

And I don’t know how to answer that.

Because it’s not really over. Not yet. He still has chemo until May 17—twenty more days. Twenty days that feel both impossibly short and impossibly long. Twenty days after everything we’ve already walked through.

And then… it changes.

We’ll still go in every three months for blood draws—but not here. Not in our place. Not with our people. Just a regular lab. A place where no one knows our story. A place where we’re just another name on a chart.

And that’s the part that breaks me in a way I didn’t expect.

We won’t come back here anymore.

We won’t see the faces that held us together when we were falling apart.

We’re just… supposed to leave.

And somehow, I’m supposed to go back to normal.

But what is normal after this?

What does normal look like after your world has been completely turned upside down? After you’ve lived in survival mode for years? After your child has fought something that changes you forever?

How do you just… go back?

How do you pretend it didn’t happen?

Because it did happen.

It changed everything.

I’m going to miss this place more than I ever thought I would.

I’m going to miss the appointments.

I’m going to miss the people who became so much more than just doctors and nurses.

They gave us something I don’t even know how to put into words—love, compassion, patience, strength when we didn’t have any left. They stepped into the darkest chapter of our lives and helped carry us through it.

And the hardest part to understand is that this is just their everyday.

They walk into this world every single day.

They hold families like ours, over and over again.

The lives they’ve touched. The weight they carry.

And somehow, we were just one story among so many.

And now… we’re walking out of it.

I know this is a new chapter. I know this is what we hoped for.

Right now, Parker is cancer-free.

Even writing that feels unreal.

Like something too fragile to say out loud.

It’s beautiful. It’s overwhelming. It’s everything.

And still—I’m scared.

Scared of what comes next.

Scared of letting go of the place that made us feel safe.

Scared of stepping into a life that’s supposed to feel normal again… when I don’t feel normal anymore.

And then there’s the part of me that still feels angry.

The part that still asks, why us?

I hate that I even feel that way—but I do.

Because I would never wish this on anyone. Not ever.

But it doesn’t take away the frustration of having to live through it.

Two and a half years.

Countless doctor’s appointments.

Plans constantly changing because numbers are too low.

Days and nights spent inside hospital walls.

A life that doesn’t look anything like the one we had before.

A life we never chose.

And it’s hard—so hard—to carry all of that and then step into what’s supposed to be “after.”

I’m frustrated that this is part of our story.

That this is something we had to survive.

And yet… this is our story.

We’re here.

We made it through something I wasn’t sure we would.

But we didn’t come out the same.

We’re standing in this space between what was and what’s next—

not who we used to be,

not quite sure who we are now.

Just… moving forward.

One step at a time.

Here’s to what comes next.