How To Talk to Someone Who Has Terminal Cancer
First off. No worries. There is no right or wrong way because every one of us is different. What works well with one of us will bomb with someone else.
I guess the thing to do is consider the person. Are they religious? Are they emotional? Are they the kind of person whom you can talk easily with?
I guess I will just tell you how to talk to me. The others? They can fucking get their own blogs.
1) It's okay to cry. It really is. Just not an avalanche.
2) Don't tell me it's going to be okay. It isn't. But, it will work out as it is supposed to work out. If I am destined to be one of the very, very few who get a miracle cure, it will happen and we will go out and celebrate. If not, well....I gave it my best shot. Come to my memorial service and have cookies.
3) It is also okay to say that you are praying for me. I am not particularly religious, but I do believe in the power of prayer to help. No. I don't believe that if you say ten rosaries every day, I will be cured. If you want to try, be my guest. Can't hurt. Might help. And what I love most about prayer? You are thinking kindly of me. That means something in this world.
4) Don't talk about cancer ALL THE TIME. I have this really awful thing in my life but it isn't the only thing. I'm also reading books, going to plays, trying my hand at making soap and lotion for Christmas presents and spending a LOT of time at the park, sitting on that bench by the water. It is cold, but I think best there, so I bundle up. I feel really, really close to my parents when I am sitting on that bench. I have a life outside of cancer. Let's talk about that, too. Plus, I really do want to hear about your life, your problems. It makes me feel more human. Cancer has this way of isolating you from others. Tell me about how your daughter in law bores the hell out of you or you have this co-worker who seems to not understand social cues.
5) Don't pretend like I don't have cancer. This means, don't act like nothing is wrong. Address it. Move on.
6) Gallows humor is appreciated. I have a friend that occasionally sits with me when I go to the park. Her name is Charlene and she is not someone I would be friends with, as a rule. She is a Republican, which...welll......gag me. She loves to do crafts. Again....just. no. She talks baby talk to her husband when he calls her on the phone. That right there is a huge red flag. But, she also has cancer. Pancreatic cancer. It's a pretty powerful thing to have in common. Last week, we were talking about climate change. We both agreed that we are glad that we won't be around to see the world become uninhabitable because of huge weather problems. I did remind her that Trump is doing NOTHING to solve this problem. She ruefully agreed. ("He is kind of a disappointment, I will admit that.") She told her husband that he had to go to her sister's house in Wisconsin for Christmas because "I'm dying here, buddy boy." I say that now I get to pick the restaurants we go to every single time because I have cancer. "Soon enough, I won't be able to eat without puking. So, I pick Wheatfields. Suck it." So, yeah...you might be surprised how amenable I am to gallows humor.
And that is really it. Metastatic breast cancer is really, really different for each case. First, it must be determined what kind of cancer it is. Then, a treatment is planned and administered. From what I understand about metastatic breast cancer is that it is not uncommon for one drug not to work and then you just move on to the next. There are several choices of treatment.
Some people die quickly. Others live for many years. Everyone is different. All we really have in common is that we know that we don't have a long future and that we have to fit a lot of life into these last times.
So, come along with me and let's have some good times. I'm not dead yet.
I guess the thing to do is consider the person. Are they religious? Are they emotional? Are they the kind of person whom you can talk easily with?
I guess I will just tell you how to talk to me. The others? They can fucking get their own blogs.
1) It's okay to cry. It really is. Just not an avalanche.
2) Don't tell me it's going to be okay. It isn't. But, it will work out as it is supposed to work out. If I am destined to be one of the very, very few who get a miracle cure, it will happen and we will go out and celebrate. If not, well....I gave it my best shot. Come to my memorial service and have cookies.
3) It is also okay to say that you are praying for me. I am not particularly religious, but I do believe in the power of prayer to help. No. I don't believe that if you say ten rosaries every day, I will be cured. If you want to try, be my guest. Can't hurt. Might help. And what I love most about prayer? You are thinking kindly of me. That means something in this world.
4) Don't talk about cancer ALL THE TIME. I have this really awful thing in my life but it isn't the only thing. I'm also reading books, going to plays, trying my hand at making soap and lotion for Christmas presents and spending a LOT of time at the park, sitting on that bench by the water. It is cold, but I think best there, so I bundle up. I feel really, really close to my parents when I am sitting on that bench. I have a life outside of cancer. Let's talk about that, too. Plus, I really do want to hear about your life, your problems. It makes me feel more human. Cancer has this way of isolating you from others. Tell me about how your daughter in law bores the hell out of you or you have this co-worker who seems to not understand social cues.
5) Don't pretend like I don't have cancer. This means, don't act like nothing is wrong. Address it. Move on.
6) Gallows humor is appreciated. I have a friend that occasionally sits with me when I go to the park. Her name is Charlene and she is not someone I would be friends with, as a rule. She is a Republican, which...welll......gag me. She loves to do crafts. Again....just. no. She talks baby talk to her husband when he calls her on the phone. That right there is a huge red flag. But, she also has cancer. Pancreatic cancer. It's a pretty powerful thing to have in common. Last week, we were talking about climate change. We both agreed that we are glad that we won't be around to see the world become uninhabitable because of huge weather problems. I did remind her that Trump is doing NOTHING to solve this problem. She ruefully agreed. ("He is kind of a disappointment, I will admit that.") She told her husband that he had to go to her sister's house in Wisconsin for Christmas because "I'm dying here, buddy boy." I say that now I get to pick the restaurants we go to every single time because I have cancer. "Soon enough, I won't be able to eat without puking. So, I pick Wheatfields. Suck it." So, yeah...you might be surprised how amenable I am to gallows humor.
And that is really it. Metastatic breast cancer is really, really different for each case. First, it must be determined what kind of cancer it is. Then, a treatment is planned and administered. From what I understand about metastatic breast cancer is that it is not uncommon for one drug not to work and then you just move on to the next. There are several choices of treatment.
Some people die quickly. Others live for many years. Everyone is different. All we really have in common is that we know that we don't have a long future and that we have to fit a lot of life into these last times.
So, come along with me and let's have some good times. I'm not dead yet.
Just half an hour ago I posted a comment saying how happy I was to have found your blog again. And then I got to the part where you said that your cancer was back and terminal. So that was quite the rollercoaster ride. I feel like I’ve followed so much of your life on your old blog, when you were still using codenames for security’s sake. (What happened to Socks btw? Is he still around and happy?) I was sad when your posts stopped showing up in my feedreader. I thought about you over the years, wondered how you were doing. So in a weird and strange way, it felt like a friend was telling me they had terminal cancer just after I had finally run into them again. I’m going to send you all my gallow’s humour. I inherited it from my dad and further developed it when he died, so I’ve got a very decent amount of it to spare :)
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