Fighting cancer is brutal and unrelenting.
From the moment you wake in the morning – sometimes even while you sleep – it occupies the conscious and subconscious mind. Treatment. Side effects. Test results. Is the treatment working? What is the prognosis? What comes next?
Even the strongest mind can be overtaken by it. At times, mine was.
When a person fighting cancer also has a demanding job, two all-consuming forces collide. Fighting for your health while remaining fully committed to your work can feel impossible. I learned that determination – and perhaps some measure of mind over matter – can make room for both.
The balance was not easy. There were days when strength just meant fighting the disease with all I had. Other days, strength meant getting
out of bed, getting dressed and walking into the office to do one of the most demanding jobs imaginable.
Most days, I carried the full weight of both.
Cancer can make your world very small. I worked hard not to let it.
The approach I took will not be right, or possible, for everyone. I have profound respect and empathy for every person enduring treatment for this disease. It drains you physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually.
For me, work provided something critically important: a mission larger than myself.
Cancer can make your world very small. It can reduce life to chemotherapy appointments, blood tests, scans, medications and side effects. Even surrounded by family and friends, cancer can be desperately lonely. There is a temptation to measure each day by how sick you feel.
I worked hard not to let breast cancer become the center of everything. Instead, I directed as much of my energy as I could toward doing my job. People depended on me to be strong and clear-eyed, and I was determined not to let them down.
Work did not make the cancer disappear from my mind. However, it reminded me that I was still myself – and that my life was about more than my disease.
I was also aware that people were watching.
Would she be able to lead? Be consumed by her illness? Be less effective?
My team inside and outside the White House made all the difference
Cancer robs you, at least temporarily. It took some of my stamina, mobility and, on certain days, my focus. I could not always be everywhere I wanted or needed to be.
That is precisely why an exceptional team, united by trust and committed to excellence, was indispensable.
I know without a doubt that winning, leading and succeeding are team sports. Talent matters, but talent alone is not enough. A successful team cannot simply be a collection of impressive but disconnected individuals.
It must be a cohesive group whose members trust one another, anticipate one another’s needs, carry one another when necessary and remain focused on a common purpose.
I trusted that our team would be tested when I was less than my healthy self.
It was.
Throughout my fight with cancer, a talented, hardworking and deeply devoted team, inside the White House and outside, made all the difference. People stepped forward without hesitation, filled every gap, carried additional weight and never allowed me to feel that I was carrying this burden alone. I will never be able to repay them.
I am blessed with two compassionate and wonderful daughters who traveled every step of this road with me. My extended family and dear friends surrounded me with encouragement, love, prayers and countless offers of help – for which I am grateful.
The same is true of the remarkable people responsible for my medical care. As I entered this experience, I had no idea what to expect. They carried me through this journey with medical expertise, compassion, honesty, patience and constant encouragement.
When you are fighting cancer, your medical team becomes an extension of your family. They gave me superb medical care, but also emotional strength, reassurance, candor and friendship.
They carried me toward health.
To have these particular people in my life at this precise moment is divine intervention. I thank God for them every day.
Chemo tested me in ways I never imagined. Now I'm ready to rebuild.
And so, here I am following successful surgery, with pathology showing no residual cancer. I am, indeed, cancer free.
It was a difficult road.
Because chemotherapy is, in a word, a b----.
Chemotherapy tested me in ways I could never have anticipated. The next stage will require a serious commitment to rebuilding what treatment took from me.
But rebuilding is a challenge I welcome because it reminds me that I have come through the hardest part.
I know my way will not be everyone’s way, and my job is unusual in its demands. I share this experience in the hope that it might help even one person going through treatment understand this:
Cancer does not have to take away who you are.
With grit, determination, faith and the support of extraordinary people, it is possible to fight this disease while continuing to embrace the work, relationships and sense of purpose that make you who you are.
For me, that means serving my president and my country. I will always be grateful to President Donald Trump for the kindness and compassion while I was undergoing treatment.
It also means being a mother, a grandmother and a friend.
Yes, cancer took something from me, but it also gave me a deeper appreciation for the people who carried me, the purpose that sustained me and the preciousness of every day.
I am grateful to every one of them.
And, most especially, I am grateful to God.
Susie Wiles is President Donald Trump's chief of staff.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Susie Wiles: I'm cancer-free, but the fight is unrelenting | Exclusive
