Yesterday afternoon was my weekly Skype therapy session, and, not knowing what to talk about, I told the therapist about the stress and worry over the test appointments earlier this week.
‘It seems you’re worrying about the processes and administration more than what it’s all about, which is the opposite of what most people would do’ she said.
By ‘what it’s all about’, of course, she meant cancer – but honestly, what’s that to worry about? If that sounds flippant, we’re not talking here about any particular risk. The infusion I’m going for on Saturday (tests permitting, and I’m still waiting for the result) isn’t even directly related to cancer, but to reducing the risk of side effects from the medication I’m taking to reduce the risk of the cancer coming back/happening again. And whether at some point I’ll get cancer again, or osteoporosis, or both or neither is not something I think about on a daily basis – although I do, of course, keep taking the prescribed tablets and a calcium supplement. That’s part of my routine. And going for the infusion, although uncomfortable and annoying, is also routine – this is the fifth time I’ve done it, and that followed after six sessions of chemo, which were much nastier and lasted longer but were basically the same process, in the same ward at the same hospital. So I know what I’m doing, I just have to turn up at the usual place for 10:30 on Saturday, with my Kindle to read while I’m waiting (there’s always lots of waiting) and after that it’s out of my hands.
This harks back to something I’ve said before: that getting through cancer (in my experience) is not about being ‘brave’ or emotionally strong or staying positive, it’s about doing what you’re told, turning up for the treatments, taking the meds, trusting in the expertise of the medical staff, accepting any help that’s offered. In the end, it’s a lottery, but you can buy as many tickets as you can lay your hands on to improve your chances of getting through. Even so, you could be knocked down by a car any day on your way to the local shop, so why torture yourself by worrying about death when there are so many other ways to do it?
The therapist’s response was to say: ‘There are two types of people in the world…’ and I thought she was going to say something profound, but instead it was just: ‘…those who blame themselves for everything that goes wrong and those who never blame themselves, and we know which you are,’ which we’ve talked about so many times, and didn’t seem terribly relevant or helpful in this context. I was thinking more of Chekov: ‘Any idiot can face a crisis; it’s this day-to-day living that wears you out’, which was sent to me on a card years ago by a friend who never saw her fiftieth birthday because she died of breast cancer six months before.