90%

Ninety percent.
Seems like good odds.
Of course, there is a 10% chance you will lose.

My mom was diagnosed with breast cancer this summer.
I've always been a supporter of events and fund raising for breast cancer awareness and research. But, it's always been about helping other people. It's quite a fucking jolt when your mother is the one who has a 90% chance of surviving for another 5 years. It's like walking down the street and having someone reach out from a hedge and grab you by the hair while saying "you aren't going anywhere, your mom has cancer and your reality is fucked." It's a reality filled with things like chemo, losing your hair, lots of random crying, radiation, 5-year survival rates, wigs, lumpectomies, stages of cancer, grades of tumors and a sickening lump of fear in your stomach that has taken up residence permanently.

I am scared for my mom. State of mind is vital through out this fight she has on her hands. State of mind has never been my mother's strong suit. I worry that she won't fight for herself, that she will give up and let it win. What do I do?

I have to be there for her. But I can't do anything to really help her, I can't make it go away. This sucks. I don't know if I should joke with her, to help her think about something else or if I should just shut up and listen as she talks about how scared she is, how much it sucks to be losing her hair, how tired and sick she feels.

I am scared for me.
My chance of developing breast cancer just doubled. At 35, I just had my first mammogram. When I called to make the appointment, telling them it was my first time, the conversation goes like this:

"Oh, you are too young, you don't need your first mammogram until you are 40 unless someone in your immediate family has had it."
"Yeah, I know."
(pause)
"Let's see when we can get you in."

It's entirely too early. She's only in her 50's. I am not ready for her to be gone.
And of course, the odds are very good that she will be fine.
But cancer is a scary word, no matter what the odds.
Cancer shoves death in your face in a way that few other things do.

I remember someone I am very close to going through this very thing with his own mother. She had colon cancer and was given a 90% of being just fine. When you are on the outside, looking in, 90% seems fucking fantastic. Why would you worry, 90% is peachy.

But it's not. 90% sucks. When this first happened, they were saying her tumor was new, it was small, it would be stage 1, maybe stage 2 and the 5-year survival rate was 100%.

100% - Now there is a number I can get behind. Absolutely no chance for failure at 100%.
A sure thing.

Turns out, the lump is a bit larger than they thought, when it comes out. She had a clean mammogram in January. By July she had a 2.5 cm tumor. This, they say, is too fast. This earns her a year's worth of chemotherapy and five years of some other drugs. So much for that sure thing. They dropped her odds to 90%.

The distance between 100% and 90% has never ever seemed so far. There is an ocean of full of death between 90% and 100%. For the next 5 years, we wait, we watch, we fill her body full of chemicals and poison as a preventative measure and cross our fingers as we huddle on the bed hopping the monster underneath won't venture out and get us before the sun comes up.