Things They never tell you about having had cancer:

1. While cancer might be simultaneously boring and terrifying, it beats waiting for the surveillance scans. There's an up-and-down rhythm to getting your lymph nodes biopsied (ow!) that just isn't matched by the four-month drag that is waiting for your first chest CT.

2. Growing your hair out after having had cancer sucks just as much as it does when you're well. You still have weird flippy pieces and flat bits, and you still look like hell, but at least nobody says anything snarky. They just look at you and say, "You lookin' good. Whassup with yo' 'fro?" (credit: Friend Lisa from work.)

3. Every beer, every french fry, every night out on the town is larded with guilt that This Might Be The Thing that tips you over the edge into another horrible diagnosis.

4. Your blood pressure will always be a source of concern for the nurses at your surgeon's office, and they'll waste lots of paperwork on you before you say, through gritted teeth, "MY PRESSURES ARE HIGH BECAUSE I DON'T WANT ANOTHER BIT CUT OUT OF MY HEAD, THANK YOU VERY MUCH."

5. Your foresight in putting all your favorite colognes at the back of the closet during the first week of treatment will be rewarded when a patient in the chemotherapy unit says you smell good.