Guest Post: Dealing with a Cancer Diagnosis

Hi everyone! My name’s Liz, I live near London, and I’d like to thank Sagan for the opportunity to do a guest blog on her website, which I’ve been a fan of for several months now. This is my first ever blog post – not before time I guess. In our lifetimes 1 in 3 of us will get cancer. Some of you might have done so already, and most of you will know someone who has. This blog is about dealing with the diagnosis. I was told I had breast cancer in 2006, when I was 42. It was a 4cm tumor. After chemotherapy, a lumpectomy and radiotherapy, I’ve been in the clear since March 2007, and am keeping my fingers crossed. It’s not exactly a great experience, but there’s a lot you can do to make it easier to cope, and some positive things that come out of it. A lot of people can’t do enough to help, including some who will surprise you! Here’s me with no hair – my photo won’t win any prizes, but it was nothing like as bad as I’d feared:

I made a list of practical tips that I’ve sent a couple of friends who were diagnosed recently, covering everything from keeping a sense of proportion to having some sticky tape by the bed when your hair starts to fall out. If anyone would like a copy, please let me know. But there is also a big emotional impact. I was very lucky in having so much love and support from Mike, my husband, and family and friends were also terrific. If you are unlucky enough to get cancer, or someone you know is diagnosed, you might like to think about the following points:
• At the start, telling people you love is really hard. It’s horrible to keep inflicting pain on family and friends. Offering to tell others on the person’s behalf could really be welcome.
• If you’re unsure whether to mention a friend’s diagnosis to him or her, I’d say do. They can make it plain if they don’t want to talk about it, but if you don’t ask how they are, it can be misunderstood.
• There is no such thing as the wrong thing to say. So don’t worry about it and even if you think you’ve just said something crass, it doesn’t matter! The person will understand you don’t know what to say. There is one exception to this, though, which I talk about below. But in any event, big hugs speak volumes!
• Not everyone will react as you expect. You’ll probably hear from some unexpected people as the news gets round, and even get back in touch with lost friends. But some of those close to you may find it very hard to deal with and react in unexpected ways. For me, the hardest part of the whole experience was the way a close family member reacted, and some very painful things from my childhood got stirred up. It’s hard to accept people are doing their best sometimes – and yet they are.
• If you’ve got cancer, your emotions can bounce around a lot. I never felt ‘it’s not fair’ or ‘why me’ because they aren’t meaningful questions for me, but I felt a lot of anger which would sometimes erupt over the most trivial things. You should have heard me on the subject of having to keep my neck covered for a year after radiotherapy! So if a friend with cancer explodes about something petty, don’t take it personally.
• Trying to keep as healthy as possible during treatment helps, both in terms of doing whatever exercise you’re up for during chemo etc, and dealing with the stress of the illness. This is essential for the longer term future. It could put relationships under strain, and I was always conscious of the need to keep engaged with what was going on in Mike’s life, and not to take his support for granted (I was delighted when I got a chance to repay some of his care this spring when he was laid up after surgery!)
• Keep positive. Cancer is increasingly a treatable disease. While some people will be unlucky, for breast cancer 80% of victims survive at least five years, and 64% for at least 20 years. Even if a friend’s diagnosis is terminal, if they live in the UK, USA or Canada they’ll be getting some of the best treatment in the world, in countries where palliative care is taken seriously. I discussed this once with a friend my age who has since died of cancer, and we both agreed we’d far rather deal with having even terminal cancer than with having something like Alzheimer’s.
I said earlier there’s not much you can say that’s wrong. But there is one kind of comment that filled both me and the friend who later died with white-hot nuclear-button-pushing rage. And that’s when people say things like “I’m sure you can beat it. The most important weapon is the mind.” This can be said well-meaningfully but what it implies is that if your cancer becomes terminal, it’s because you’re a wuss. The most important thing is not the mind! Cancer mortality rates have not improved because people have a more positive attitude – it’s the science, d’uh. Yes, it’s important to do all you can to maximize the chances that your treatment will be effective and to minimize the burdens the illness places on others – but beyond that your attitude has no more impact than it would if you broke a bone or had chicken pox.
Finally a tip for action for people who haven’t had a cancer diagnosis – critical illness insurance policies can be wonderful things! I took one out on our mortgage when we last moved house, and to my astonishment, it paid out when I was diagnosed, paying off the mortgage and leaving a large lump sum over (the amount we’d already repaid, index-linked). This enabled me to leave my very stressful job that I’d been feeling trapped in, and find another that suited me far better and in which I can work 4 days a week. This was a huge hidden benefit, for Mike as well as for me! Get out there and check your insurance cover!
Check out Liz’s twitter profile at @lizwicksteed!