The Metamorphosis - My Mom's Outlook After Breast Cancer

Years after my mom was told she was in full remission, I was home from school for break. It was probably spring break because the light in my memory feels blue, and I notice the light in my head changes colors depending on the season. Summer light is yellow, fall is brown, winter is grey, and spring is blue.

In my memory, I've got a headache and I tell my mom about it. She is propped up on the bed, her laptop open on her lap, in the guest bedroom (this is the place she does all of her homework when she isn't at the office).

"Come here," she says. "Let me try my Reiki out."

"Um, no thanks."

"Come on, it just takes a second. I've been reading everything about it."

"What makes you think it does anything?" I asked. I was always the skeptic. I still am.

"I really like Eastern philosophies," she said side stepping the question like a good politician in a pinch.

"Yeah? Me too, but that doesn't make me think you holding your hands over my head is gonna make my headache go away."

"How do you know? It could do something."

"Yeah there's been a million studies that show it doesn't do anything," I said.

"Yeah well, if you test for gravity in space you won't get much either. Maybe their measurement for success was wrong."

Typically my mom doesn't like to argue so she will say something smart really early on hoping to avoid at all costs the ensuing debate. I like to argue so I tend to save anything smart for the end when I've gotten all the fun out of the battle. But this time I just gave up.

"Whatever," I said. So she held her hands over my head for about 20 seconds. I didn't feel any better at the end of it. "Is that it?"

"Well, I'm still learning. Feel any better?"

"Nope," I said.

"Well maybe before you weren't ready to feel better, but now that your energy is aligned you can start feeling better in a little bit."

"Hff," I snorted. "Ok well I'll report back in an hour, and tell you how I feel."

"Okay," she said clearly believing I would be better when I came back. "Also, while you're here, I need you to fix my internet. It keeps going on and off and on and off and I don't get these things like you do."

"That's true," I said.

I don't remember now if I felt better in an hour, or if I even checked back. But the point isn't how I felt. My mom picked out all of her new found philosophies after being diagnosed with cancer.

It was cancer that allowed her to develop into a newer, better version of herself. And of course she was right about it all. There is a point (induced by Reiki or not) where a person's attitude towards life changes, and they are ready to heal. Maybe they do, maybe they don't, but that doesn't take away from the moment of metamorphosis. In that moment people will stop crawling and begin to fly. And for all you skeptics out there, I've got plenty of case studies to prove it.