Listening to Life.

Something changed within me thanks to my journey with cancer. I am not the same person. My body is not the same. I have a different relationship with it. There’s a lot more listening to it and a lot more respect for it. This body that has battled for me has changed. And I have changed too. I am carrying a lot less baggage. I’m moving on with my life with just what I need. No extras.

I struggle with the phrase, ‘cancer has given you a second chance’ or ‘you’ve come back from the brink’. Please don’t use those remarks. They are almost like woiyes (loosely translated to ‘oh bless’). I’ve never had a near death experience, fortunately. All I had was cancer and I’m not being glib about what I went through. Using those phrases, I find is a veiled way of the belief that for some people cancer means death. I had cancer. Battled it and every day as I take my daily pill, get a homa (flu) go for my blood tests, and even when I hear of someone’s new diagnosis or death, I still live it.

There's been a lot more ‘haki (really)cancer’ than ‘eeffff cancer’ because this is the card that has been dealt to me and many, many, many other cancer warriors. It feels like we are the foot soldiers for life. The guys at the front line of this journey. Where our mortality is laid out more than anyone else’s. All thanks to the big C, baby!

Well, if it wasn’t for the big C, I would not have been self-employed, trying to build a new career as a writer now living by the sea. It’s given me the balls to look at life straight in the eyes and dare myself and the universe. At the beginning of 2017, I quit my job and become part of the Nairobi hustle and committed myself to do the things that really make me happy. I had actually thought I was doing that, but I think I had ring-fenced that happy. Looking back, it was a safe and collective happy. It wasn’t until one day when I was taking a walk within the Nairobi Arboretum that I questioned this happy. I was a little frustrated that my blood markers had just plateaued. They weren’t going up nor going down. My doctor said it was normal for that to happen, but I wanted my results to have the same font size, with no markers in bold indicating that something was either above or below par. I was frustrated because I thought I was doing all the right things, exercising, eating well, reducing stress and managing my workload. Yaani, my life was zero drama. But my markers…

I was also beginning to feel uncomfortable in Nairobi. All of a sudden it was starting to feel very toxic and I was looking for opportunities to get away from the city when I could. I wanted to see people and be seen. Often, I’d back my laptop and go! My therapist would tell that I was a lot calmer whenever I returned to the city. I knew I liked being in green spaces and by huge masses of water and that was when I started looking out. Looking for a new place to call ‘home’. I’m a city boy, born and bred, but the city that I called home, didn’t feel welcoming anymore. It was a safe place to be and at times too safe. Yes, Nairobi has a buzz and energy to it, but I wanted more of less of that. This led me to the opposite ends of the country, Kisumu and Kilifi. Kilifi obviously won. Nam Lolwe (Lake Victoria), was magnificent, calming, and enchanting and home to the most beautiful sunsets in the country, but the sea was calling. And after so many years of wandering, I was now listening and my body seemed to acknowledge that.

Moving to the coast is not about second chances. It’s about new opportunities, learning, unlearning and relearning a lot about my country, a culture that had been distant, my history that is my story and living. Truly living. Self-care.

I now live a simple life. Asking myself what is enough, what is important and what is true is a journey that I have embarked on? If a Multiple Myeloma diagnosis had not happened in October 2015, I would have been on another journey altogether. I believe we get more than second chances, we get various opportunities to look at life and look at ourselves. Things will happen to you and I that will force us to stop, listen and decide. That’s life, this life. And I’m listening more now.