Friendships and Cancer or other Ailments

This is an ever popular topic in the cancer blogsphere - friends and cancer (or other ailments). More specifically the friends who either:

• run for the  hills
• become a doctor instantly and tell you what treatment you need
• think you will be dead in a month

But then there are the real friends who stick around when you are coping and help as they can.

AARP suggests saying a heartfelt 'I'm sorry' upon hearing someone is ill. I'm not so sure I would appreciate that as much as something more along the lines of 'well that really sucks'. But their other suggestions are good.

Then there is 'A Field Guide to the Wildlife of Cancer' which narrows down the categories to:

• Preachers
• Clueless
• Angels
• Bolters
• Fellow Travelers

I find there are too many preachers, clueless, and bolters out there. And far too many fellow travelers as well, but that's a different post.It doesn't matter if its cancer you are talking about, this applies to just about any serious life changing ailment.

Some times I get so tired of some people I stop telling them about my ailments or newest medical adventure because its just stressful to keep hearing the same crap from the preachers, clueless, and bolters (if you can find them).

You cant tell other people how to feel

You can't tell someone else how to feel about anything, especially about a cancer diagnosis. In this morning's Ask Amy column and woman writes in about how her mother seems to be upset and feels that she is dying. The writer was treated for cancer and is currently fine. The mother is symptomatic of cancer, not yet diagnosed and thinks she is going to die, taking a woe is me attitude.

The writer is concerned that her mother's attitude is so bad and that she needs to change it.

Hello! Her mother isn't feeling well. She is symptomatic of something, may be not even cancer, but clearly not feeling well.

I think that the writer (daughter) needs to take a step back here and let her mother cope and more importantly get her to a doctor asap.

It might or might not be cancer so she is sitting in this state of limbo trying to figure out what is going on with her life. The waiting, I know personally, is awful. The daughter is trying to make her mother feel something she is not. Back off.

If you don't have your health, what have you got?

Some of us look at the rich and famous, the Hollywood stars, and others and think they have it all. Beauty, riches, and fame seem to be everything.

But they are wrong. If you don't have your health, what do you have? Sofia Vergara had thyroid cancer 12 years ago. A recent article about her provides her reactions to thyroid cancer diagnosis and treatment.

"She said that you realize that no matter how much beauty, money, and success you have, if you don't have health, you have nothing, because you can't do anything."

Personally I think I am as healthy as a horse on the way to the glue factory.

It only took Sofia 12 years from her cancer diagnosis to be able to sum this up in one sentence and she may have gotten there sooner. I am a little slow. It probably took me a long longer to be able to react to a cancer diagnosis in the same way.

But if you think about it, one of our fundamental reactions to a cancer diagnosis, I think, is that we have lost our health because we are now told we have a potentially terminal ailment. So what else do we have? That is where we need to figure out so we can adapt and get back to living.

Life after cancer

There is a term for  life after cancer. It is 'Survivorship'. I am not a fan of the word at all. I consider survivor a label and all I have ever survived is a bunch of doctor appointments. But I digress.

There is now focus on 'survivorship' studies or the lack of them. Doctors focus on treating patients but historically have been paying less attention to the patient's quality of life issues after treatment. It is not uncommon for cancer treatment to leave patients with a range of issues. This new field is also called 'patient activation' (which isn't much better than the 's-word'. It provides "education, resources, and services for issues of survivors such as sexuality, cognitive issues, fertility, neuropathy, returning back to primary care, depression and late effects such as second cancers and cardiac issues."

If you think about how harsh cancer treatment really is compounded by the emotions behind a diagnosis, it is not surprising that the patients are left with such a range issues.

It is just sad that it has taken modern medicine so long to realize that we do need help after treatment.

Did cancer make me paranoid?

I actually started this blog post over a year ago and in an effort to clear out unposted posts, I am finally finishing this one. Apparently I am still concerned that cancer made me paranoid. Am I always assuming the worst with every medical issue? Yes, I do. Its not just a sprained ankle, its a life long problem ankle that refuses to get better. It doesn't help that I keep respraining it.

But did two cancer diagnoses always make me assume the worst from my doctor appointments? Sometimes yes. Its called welcome to the 'its-not-a-headache-its-a-brain-tumor' world.

A cancer diagnosis makes you overly concerned over every little ailment. Especially the ones where your doctor looks at it and says 'hmmm.... this is very unusual'. I dont really have any of those right now. But I do have the ones where my doctor says 'let me talk to your oncologist and get back to you on that' and 'lets wait a month and see how things are going'. But I don't think I'm overly paranoid, may be just a tiny bit.