Dr. Green said, “cancer”.

 

Maria had just asked “have you found out what’s affecting Ken yet?”  We were in the hospital room I had spent the last week in.  I was there because the results of the tests would be available weeks sooner than if he had made them in his office.

 

Cancer.  ‘That word’ said so many things.  Things I had never suspected would apply to me, or to us.

 

“Okay...what’s next?” asked Maria.  It was nearly six weeks later before I finally grasped ‘that word’.  My mind refused to go beyond the hearing of ‘that word’.

 

What are the images, words, feelings, and emotions that pop into your head as soon as someone says, “Cancer”?  Many months later I found out that when we told my  mother her first thought was, “where will he be buried?”  I suggest that is how most people react.  Their first thought, image, emotion or    feeling is one version or another of death.  In my case I was numb, in shock, and I wasn’t even aware that I was.  I did what was “expected” of me.  I was stoically quiet, but not silent.  I maintained a proper stiff upper lip.  I was polite.  I didn’t whine.  I smiled.

 

Towards the end of the fifth week I finally accepted and integrated ‘that word’ internally.  CANCER!  I exploded in anger, resentment, self pity, and fear.  I wanted to escape from what had happened to me.  I thought seriously about suicide.  When we were alone in bed I poured it all out to Maria and it frightened her.  Badly.  Immensely.  She had never seen me with an attitude like this.  I saw what I was doing to her.  I hated myself for doing it.  But I couldn’t stop myself.  I was consumed in rage and there was no way to express it.

 

I did try to tone it down for the rest of the world.  I kept doing the “Expected” thing.  Inside, all I could see was financial ruin, probable death or disability.  I was on my way towards deep despair and           depression.  My body was not working the way it was supposed to.  My energy level was lower each day that passed.  Just waking up was exhausting.  I couldn’t see any hope anywhere in the universe.  I   couldn’t even see the universe.  The entire existence of everything was encompassed within me.  I had ‘that word’ and it was beginning to be the definition of me.

 

People said, “It’s important that you keep your attitude positive...we have much better treatments today than used to be available...many survivors see cancer as a gift, I’m sure you will too...hang in there.”   Inside I’m saying, “yeah, right...a gift...who do they think they’re fooling?”

 

If my attitude didn’t change I was going to die.  There isn’t any doubt about it.  The cancer was irrelevant.  My own thoughts were going to kill me.  All it would have taken was for me to keep repeating everything that was going on in my head until I believed it.

 

I got help from a source that I didn’t expect.. The other people who had ‘that word’.  The other  patients.  At first it was just enough for me to recognize that my attitude was terrible and  completely                  unreasonable.  I hate self pity and I was wallowing in it.  I have known  for decades that the only one

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