I’m sure you have heard or used the phrase “All good things must come to an end”. While its meaning in English traditional language that we use today dates back to about 1680, the phrase was first used by English poet Geoffrey Chaucer in his poem “Troilus and Criseyde”
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For those not familiar with Chaucer’s work he was known as the greatest English poet of the Middle Ages and is best known for writing “Canterbury Tales”.
My use of that phrase is obvious today as this is the final part of our look into the brilliant mind of blogger and cancer survivor Rachael Yahne. Back in May of 2016, she wrote an article for the Huffington Post titled “5 Things They Never Tell You About Life After Cancer”. Here is her fifth and final thing they never tell you about.
People will be scared to ask you questions (even though they'll have a lot of questions)
I think if you took a poll with my family members as to who this applied to in my life, the answer you would receive back would be my late father. John Joseph Kelly was an AVID question asker. He was a master at it. I pray that our counterintelligence experts are as relentless and oblivious to how bad that made him look. I think he knew, however. He had to.
Like I stated in my book when you are dealing with the unknown, the way you would normally communicate changes drastically.
DON’T FORCE IT
The biggest mistake family members or supporters feel is that they think the patient is judging them on what type of questions they ask and how they ask them. I honestly can’t remember any time I got angry at someone cause of the way they asked a question. I was very blessed to have many family members who were very supportive of me.
WHY?
Now that I am on the other side of the fence, I understand why those who are affected by a loved one getting cancer can be so confused.
Imagine meeting your idol. If you had five minutes to talk to them, some might just spew words like verbal diarrhea, some might freeze, some might walk away.
Be your own advocate. Empowering patients.
The same thing might happen if you see a soldier coming home from a worn-torn country that just spent the last 18 months facing death, seeing extreme poverty, getting shot at, worrying if their car is going to explode from a planted IED or land mine. How can you relate to that?
It all has to do with feeling pressure. When you see someone suffering, it is hard to identify with that level of pain if you have never have experienced it. The fear of not saying the wrong thing overtakes you.
BEST THING YOU CAN DO
Going back to the points earlier, someone experiencing chemotherapy, radiation, or any other treatment related to their diagnosis, already is adjusting to so many horrific changes that it can cause severe mental and physical trauma.
You don't have to be perfect. You just have to be yourself and remember the person they are, what they like, their interests, etc. Take a day to go over and play a video game or board game or watch a movie with them.
SILENCE CAN BE GOLDEN
Sometimes people forget the comfort that silence can bring. Instead of blabbing on and on, hug them, hold their hand, rub their back, or just sit there and be silent with them.
THANK YOU FOR YOUR SUPPORT! SPREAD THE WORD!
Thank you for taking the time out of your busy day to read my blog. The hope I have for this is to finally get national exposure for patients and survivors who had their livelihood and ability to work taken from them. Every day I worry about how I'm going to survive six months from now if I don't start seeing the results of all the hard work and whatever savings I had to invest into my dream of creating a platform for people like me.
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God Bless - My prayers and support are with all of you.
NEXT BLOG DATE: August 29, 2019