It's Jason's Birthday | Halifax, NS

Jason must have known I didn't have a special post written for his birthday, so he wrote one himself - and managed to make it all about me!  I am a lucky girl... K

As is usually the case, I didn’t have anything special planned to mark my birthday last year. I never consider my birthday to be a big deal and even if it falls on a weekend I rarely go out for drinks to celebrate.  When I think about it, I’m not the one who should be receiving cards and gifts on my birthday. My mother is the one who did all the work on April 5^th 1980, so she should probably get some presents and cards to mark the occasion. Do I deserve rewards for just managing to exist for another year? Probably not. But that is a discussion for another day.

I didn’t know it at the time but my 30^th birthday would be my last.  Actually, right up until the evening of April 5^th last year I was still expecting some sort of simple celebration to mark my 31^st birthday. Maybe just sharing some cake or going out for supper.  Little did I know that April 5^th would be so different last year and every year from then on.

See, last year on this day my wonderful girlfriend, Karen, found out that she didn’t have to have chemotherapy to treat her breast cancer. I got home from work around 7pm that night; Karen had met with her oncologist that afternoon - the only appointment she had that I hadn't been able to attend.  She called to tell me the wonderful news.  She was dreading having to go through chemo and knowing she didn’t have to made us ecstatic. She told me that a group of us would be going out to celebrate the news and to celebrate my birthday. But that wasn’t what we were doing. We were going out to celebrate No Chemo Day. We were going out to celebrate how amazing she had been through all the appointments and the treatments, how well she handled the surgery and how, through it all, she managed to impress us with her courage and strength.  

So, from now on April 5^th isn’t my birthday. It is No Chemo Day. Trust me, I’m in no way upset or even a tad bit disappointed that I no longer get a birthday - not only do I get to celebrate something much, much more important on this day from now on but from what I understand since I don’t have any more birthdays I will apparently stop aging. ;-)

If you are still looking for a birthday party today, I bet Colin Powell will have a nice one. Although he probably doesn’t need any more presents or money.

But if I were you I would take a minute to celebrate No Chemo Day today. And to thank Karen for making it all possible.

Happy No Chemo Day, Karen.

ILYP2,

J