If you know, you know: Living with scanziety

If you know, you know. The blood tests, the scans, the quiet moments in the waiting room. The deep breath before the needle or the scan, the forced smile at the technician, the casual small talk that feels anything but casual. The sound of your name being called, the shuffle of papers, the cool touch of the examination table. And then… waiting.

Waiting for the call. The email. The portal update. Refreshing the page like it changes anything. Telling yourself not to overthink, but your mind runs through every possibility anyway. Trying to stay busy, but the thoughts sneak in between tasks, creeping in like an uninvited guest.

This is scanziety…

It’s the fear of the unknown, which keeps building from the moment I get the letter about my annual screening. The what-ifs that stir at 2 AM when the world is quiet but your mind is loud. It’s the mental tug-of-war between optimism and dread, between hoping for good news and preparing for the worst. It’s the exhausting cycle of reminding yourself to stay calm while your heart pounds against your ribcage.

Since my surgery, I’ve had three false alarms; three moments when my heart stopped as I or my oncologist felt something that shouldn’t be there. Each time, I braced myself for the worst. Each time, I went through the motions of booking the scan, waiting for the appointment, trying not to let my mind run too far ahead. And each time, relief washed over me when an ultrasound or mammogram showed it was just a seroma, fibrosis or scar tissue. But that initial fear, the sleepless nights, the overanalysing, the pretending to be fine when my mind was spiralling that part never gets easier.

Scanziety is the weight of waiting. It’s googling symptoms even though you swore you wouldn’t. It’s replaying conversations with your doctor, searching for hidden meanings in their tone. It’s telling yourself you’re probably fine while secretly preparing for your world to flip.

But scanziety is also a testament to resilience. To getting up every morning and choosing to move forward, even when uncertainty feels like a heavy fog. 

Here are a few things that have helped me cope, maybe they’ll help you too:

• Name it out loud: Telling a friend, partner, or even writing it down reminds me I don’t have to carry it alone.
• Ground my body: A walk, a stretch, or a few deep breaths keep me from living entirely in my head.
• Set “worry windows”: I give myself a time of day to feel it, journal it, cry if I need to, so it doesn’t bleed into every moment.
• Distract with intention: A meet up with friends, a movie night with the family, a routine task... anything that gives my brain a break from spinning.
• Lean on my circle: I remind myself that people actually want to show up if I let them.
• Limit Dr. Google: If I feel the urge to spiral, I pause and ask: “Am I seeking facts or feeding fear?”
• Celebrate the now: On the days I’m waiting, I make a point of finding one small thing... having a coffee in my garden, a walk by the beach, a laugh with my family to pull me back to the present.

I’m still learning to trust my body again. Moving forward each day with hope, hope it won’t betray me, and a prayer that treatment keeps working. Yes, the cancer might return… or maybe it won’t. Anything is possible. But right now, I’m here. I’m breathing. I’m loved. And that’s enough reason to embrace life fully.

For anyone in this waiting game, I see you. I feel you. You are not alone. We keep going. One day, one breath, one screening result at a time.

And when the wait is over, no matter the outcome, we pick up, we breathe, and we keep moving forward. Because that’s what we do. We endure. We live.