But, Why? Dealing with a Cancer Diagnosis

When my mother was first diagnosed with endometrial cancer, it was as if the chessboard of her life was thrown up in the air.  Plans that were on the horizon were suddenly on pause.  Meetings for blood work, scans, and surgery became unwelcome and urgent replacements for family and social contact.  Her confusing and troubling symptoms came into crystal clear focus but also pulled the rug right out from under her.  Once she knew what she was dealing with, she had two overwhelming demands. First and foremost, get this thing out of me.  That ‘thing’ was her uterus, my first home where she and I first met.  It was no longer a hopeful, fecund source of life for her but a betrayal.  An internal threat to the life she had left to live.   Her second demand wasn’t of her body, her family, or her physician, per se. It’s a demand that I have heard across my time as an oncology nurse, from hospital beds, infusion chairs, and clinic rooms.  She demanded to know, why me?  

In many ways, this question/demand from my mother was an entirely logical one.  Risk averse and strait-laced, my mother’s biggest vices are sweets and gossip.  Never a smoke or a drink, certainly never an illicit substance, even caffeine was a no-no throughout my childhood.  Hard partying would be a long dinner with more desserts than people.  No workplace hazards, no radiation exposure, no family history.   And never a serious physical medical condition to speak of; she takes no medications having somehow maintained excellent blood pressure, cholesterol, and blood sugar numbers with seemingly no effort.  In contrast, I was offered my first prescription for Crestor for high cholesterol at 23, despite running, dancing, and a vigorous yoga practice.  All to say, my mother’s health was both anomaly and taken for granted.  Nothing obvious in her history of lifestyle pointed towards cancer.

Behind these physical calculations, what I also heard in my mother’s demand is ‘what did I do to deserve this?’  What behavior, act, or way of being has landed me in the hospital with the dreaded ‘Big C’?  Haven’t I been a good person?   I made sure to play fair, treat others kindly, and put other people’s needs before mine.  For what do I need to pay this penance (that Irish Catholic guilt on full tilt, taking stock of good and bad deeds)?  I am innocent, I swear.  

In my oncology work, this idea of innocence would come up most often when I worked with children with cancer.  My stories of giving chemotherapy to babies with leukemia, shaving the heads of teens and toddlers as their hair came out in frightening clumps, or being with families as there was no more treatment left to give their child and figuring out how to go from cure to comfort made most people shake their heads in disbelief.  None of these kids could have possibly done anything to warrant a life-threatening or terminal illness and the ugliness that can be a part of treatment.  To most, it all seems so unfair.

Because it is.  And it isn’t.  Those kids didn’t deserve a cancer diagnosis and neither did my mom.  But, frankly, neither does the life long smoker deserve lung cancer nor sunbather skin cancer.  Fairness isn’t part of the cancer diagnosis game.  Circumstances can make someone susceptible and hereditary factors can predispose.  Cancer is not a punishment, a righting of some moral scale of life, evening some score.  It is not proof of some deep-seated badness.  Truthfully, no one deserves it, but some people get it.  If cancer is some part of your life right now, please know, you don’t deserve to have cancer, no matter what you have or haven’t done in your life. 

I guess this brings us to acceptance.  I know, I know but hear me out.  This tricky word, acceptance, is not a passive act or a giving up. It is not an OK-ness with or consenting to the problem landing in your lap. It is the courage to tell the truth about what is going on.  Perhaps acknowledgement is a more palatable term.  However you call it, to tell the truth about what it is you are dealing with, even if it utterly breaks your heart and has no logic whatsoever, allows you to move into clarity.  What you need comes into focus and your choices become more clear.  They may be awful, burdensome choices, a real between-a-rock-and-a-hard-place kind of scenario.  But, when the truth of what is can be accepted, change can occur.  You can move from  the stuckness of ‘why is this happening to me?’ to ‘this is what’s happening and how do I want to be in this process?’   

Back with my mom, she was still seriously wondering where things went wrong though grateful that her disease was very treatable.  A helpful resource in accepting her diagnosis was her oncologist, a physician she liked and trusted as she seemed to care about my mom and all her concerns earnestly.  A surgery date was made and she had her uterus, ovaries, and some lymph nodes removed.  The ‘thing’ had been banished to medical waste.  She did well with post-op recovery and her scans and follow-up appointments have been encouraging, no more signs of cancer.  

The other thing my mom likes about her oncologist is the time she takes to ask my mom “how’s your head?”  My mom shared that this is a relief, to have someone caring and knowledgeable with her in the uncomfortable, uncertainty of the cancer journey.  Someone who can listen to her thoughts and feelings, however big or scary they might be, without burdening a friend or family member.  It would be great if everyone going through this could have a person like that in their treatment, my mom declared.  “I think you just described a therapist, mom,” I replied with a smile. I think everyone deserves care just like that.  

Kerynne O'Malley, RN, AMFT is a former oncology RN and a dedicated therapist passionate about helping those dealing with a serious illenss. You can read more about her here and reach her at Kerynne@biglifechangetherapy.com.