I’m a tea drinker. And my cats? They are very interested in that tea.

They’ll dip a paw in it like they’re conducting a tiny scientific experiment.

They’ll stick their whole face in the mug if I’m not looking.

And they are truly obsessed with that little paper tag on the teabag. You know the one—dangling there like a taunt. Like a toy. Like a personal invitation to chaos.

So I adapted.

I tie the string tightly around the mug handle. I remove the tag completely so there is no dangling temptation. Very strategic. Very controlled. Very “I have thought through every variable.”

This ritual is so entrenched now that even when I’m not at home and I have a cup of tea, I look down and discover I have removed the tag from the teabag without even noticing that I’ve done it.

Muscle memory. Like my nervous system has decided this is a life skill that must be preserved at all costs.

You would think these precautions would be enough, wouldn’t you?

The other day, I’m sitting on the couch, tea on the end table next to me, feeling very secure in my preventive measures. And in one lightning-fast move, Stripe unties the string and flings the soaking wet teabag—splat—onto the couch.

Let me tell you, there is more tea in a wet teabag than you would think. It was all over. A full-bodied little disaster. Fortunately, the couch is brown and leather, so no major harm done. But still. The audacity of this cat. The speed. The certainty with which Stripe was like, “Your rules mean nothing.”

So why am I telling you this?

Because if you’ve had cancer, you know—deep in your bones—that you can’t control every variable.

You can think you’ve covered every base.

Every contingency.

Every possible disaster your brain can imagine.

And life will still untie the string and fling that wet teabag at the worst possible moment.

That’s what’s so brutal about the “after.” People think the hard part is over when treatment ends. But for so many women, the emotional aftershocks are where the real mental and emotional work begins.

Because you’ve already learned the lesson you never wanted to learn: bad things can happen even when you do everything “right.”

You follow the rules. You do everything “right.”

You plan. You prepare. You optimize.

You eat the things. You avoid the things.

You go to the appointments. You read the studies. You track the symptoms. You try to stay ahead of the scary possibilities as if your life depended on in, because, well…..

And you think you’ve got your fear under control.

And then… surprise.

A scan.

A symptom.

A random thought at 2 a.m. that drops into your brain like a brick:

What if this is it again?

Something you didn’t account for. Something small that wouldn’t have rattled you before cancer—an ache, a weird twinge, a wave of fatigue, a comment someone makes, a news story, an anniversary date you didn’t realize your body remembers.

And now terror strikes.

Your body tightens. Your heart starts racing. Your mind starts sprinting. You can practically feel your brain flipping open the old file labeled “Worst Case Scenarios” and saying, “We’re doing this again.”

And it’s exhausting.

We exhaust ourselves trying to control every possible future circumstance. Trying to guarantee safety by tightening every string, removing every tag, predicting every “what if.”

But control is not the same as safety.

Feeling safe isn’t just about tying the string tighter.

It’s about knowing that if the teabag hits the couch…

You can handle it.

You can clean the mess. You can breathe through the fear.

You can steady yourself when the universe pulls a “Stripe.”

Because resilience is different from control… even if, as a cancer patient, you resent the word resilience. (Fair. Very fair.)

Control says, “Nothing bad can happen.”

Resilience says, “Even if it does, I’ve got this.”

And that shift? That’s freedom.

Not freedom from uncertainty. Not freedom from ever being triggered again. But freedom from living like you have to be on high alert every second, just to earn the right to exhale.

If you’re tired of trying to control every possible airborne wet teabag in your life, let’s talk. Reach out and we can set up a time.

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