Anne posed a question or perhaps provided a thought that's pretty important to realise. Here is the quote:
"It may help to realise that the desires of those around you are less about you and more about themselves - their fears and what the 'new you' means for them. In reality all you can do is be courageously yourself and invite them to address their own issues with that. They have their own journey to the acceptance you have found and it's not your job to make that journey for them."
Those who read this blog and actually know me, may well see what problem I'd have with this straight off. That is that by my actions I've set off something that I didn't want and that I have no control or influence over. Those around me having to deal with something that I have makes me feel guilty that it has happened and that their lives are affected. It's OK to mess me around but not those who I know and love - that isn't fair is it? Mind you what is fair? Cancer isn't fair anyway and just look at this - it affects loads of people even if they haven't got it! Nasty pernicious disease.
Balance that with, I had no control over getting Cancer (and we can argue whether it was self inflicted at another time) and the quandary becomes clearer:
In my way of thinking - I have affected the lives of those around me. They have to live with that and the consequences of something that I have caused. In my normal day to day life I would be mortified if through my actions I did something, anything that would detrimentally affects others. I feel somehow responsible.
Anne's point is that actually, I can't do an awful lot about that, it is what it is and whilst I can empathise and do whatever I can I can't experience their journey for them, feel what they feel about it (if they feel anything at all about it that is) and do much about it at all.
If I accept that, then it tends to ease some of the pressure I put on myself and explain some of the concerns I've expressed in my blog. I think it also reinforces the feeling I've had for sometime that whatever is going to happen will and there isn't a great deal I can realistically do about that.
In a number of posts going right back to 2006 I've often said that I thought it was all about me, that it is a selfish thing, that only I have to go through the treatment, only I have the mental anguish, only I am sick etc. Then I counteract that with concerns for all the people that are affected by my illness and so the fight goes on in my head about this. Is it me, is it the family, is it my parents and relatives, work colleagues, friends and so on.
You can't help what has happened to you, if it had been the other way around and it had been someone I know, then what would I have felt like? I have a number of friends in the same boat as I am and whilst we all speak the same language and outwardly project the same sorts of issues with our disease, I don't have a relationship issue with them in the way that I think I would with someone in my family getting it.
I think though that Anne is indeed right about one thing. If I hadn't actually had cancer then I probably wouldn't see what all the fuss was about and I'd be getting on doing my own thing as apart from sympathy and empathy, what else could I actually do? I'd know about the treatments and the operations but not have to live through them and so they would be out of my experience and in some way distant from me, it would be a wholly different thing to live through.
It's all about me still but it is less about trying to solve everyone else's problems. I cannot do that - neither can I change their thoughts, their feelings or anything else.
Well it has given me an interesting way of looking at things and I think I have to agree with Anne's statement. Whether I like it or not, it's probably exactly what IS going on and everyone else happily gets on and does their own thing here anyway.
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2 comments:
I would argue that now I have cancer, it really IS all about me. But that fact in no way makes me more interesting.
Reaching back less than 1 year ago, when I was one of them (that did not have cancer) I recall that when encountering some who did, there were only 2 realistic scenarios.
1) You are going to die. Just a matter of how soon and how awful the process.
OR
2) It's been removed and won't come back and really the whole thing is over and can be forgotten about.
If I found the person to be in the first category I felt awful because it was bad news, and especially because there was not a damn thing that I could do to make any of it better. So I tried to avoid the person whilst being truly sympathetic.
If I found the person to be in category 2, I was happy for them, and equally happy for myself not to have to be bothered about it.
So rude but so true.
Since having cancer, I have found that folks deal with me the same way. Sort of a "please tell me you're in category 2, and we can get on with things.." attitude. With bladder cancer, there's a long road before we know if we are in category 1 or category 2, and this fact makes nearly everyone unhappy and uncomfortable. And even if in category 2, there are a few years before it's resolved. In any case there's nothing they can do for me outside of sympathy and prayer.
I think Anne's point is that there's also nothing I can do for them, other than to be strong and set an example. So don't even worry about it.
Bottom line: Having cancer and what you go through and how you adapt is all about you. Dealing with you having it and what you go through and how you adapt is all about them. Two different problems requiring different paths to solution.
Thanks Steve,
Sage words and summed up beautifully. Perhaps I've been trying too hard to help everyone else around me adapt to it when they probably don't need to.
I'm with you on the two options as well - sad but true - we are hopelessly ill equipped to deal with such things.
I need to go away and think about it some more - I may have been trying too hard.
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