The Question You Should Never Ask Someone Waiting for Cancer Results
If you’re old enough to read this, you’ll know someone who’s had cancer. Maybe you’ve lost a relative, a friend, a work acquaintance… the list goes on. The disease isn’t discriminating. And there’s a lot of information about it nowadays, information on how to spot it, how to get treatment, how to cope with treatment... But my own experience recently made it starkly clear that there isn’t a lot out there on how to be around people who are looking down the barrel of a cancer diagnosis.
When I was young, a lady from my family’s church was diagnosed with breast cancer. I was too immature to process what was happening to her, how much she — as a single woman in her seventies, facing stage four cancer — must have felt. However, what has stayed with me was her love of reading. She didn’t want to talk to me about her illness, she wanted to talk to me about books. The realisation that someone could read to stave off that kind of fear is probably why I’m a writer today. It definitely planted to seed for me to start writing my novel, Love Imperfection five years ago.That seed sprouted when a friend challenged me to write a romantic comedy with a breast cancer survivor like her who was “real” with people around her who had “real” reactions to her illness.
In the years from my novel’s first draft to pre-publication, I watched other friends kick cancer’s ass, saw how their families coped, and felt confident the whole time that my novel had captured the realities of being a cancer survivor in a way that did them justice. I’d asked the right questions, I’d gotten the emotional stuff right. Or at least I thought I had, until a lump was discovered in my left breast during a routine check on New Year’s Eve in 2018.
I remember the exact expression the radiographer — who’d been telling me that it drove her mad when people confused what she did with radiology — was wearing when she stopped talking, pursed her lips and frowned at something on the screen. There were clicks while she snapped a picture of the image and a moment of tension before she told me she’d be back in a minute. Soon there was someone else in the room who was also frowning, running the ultrasound tool over the spot on my breast and clicking too.
“You’ve found something?” I asked, ever the observant one.
“Yes.” The answer was abrupt and then the radiographer put a hand on my arm, her expression kind but grave. “You’re going to have to talk to your GP about seeing a specialist. Do it straight away.”
Being the kind of person to cheerfully downplay being smacked across the face, only to go “OW” a week later when it’s dawned on me I’ve got a broken jaw, I smiled and thanked them. I even think I joked a bit. And then I went home and calmly booked in for my GP. She sent me off to a specialist, who promptly sent me for more tests, before booking me in for a carbon biopsy. (For anyone who doesn’t know, a carbon biopsy is when they inject black stuff into the lump so it can be seen and extracted during surgery.) And every one of these appointments featured caring medical professionals who all treated me like someone who may soon receive the worst kind of news. Because let’s face it, they have to give the worst kind of news to people every day.
And this is where I discovered something that doesn’t really feature in books, movies or even in the stories of friends who’ve survived the entire ordeal.
This stuff all takes time. And that sucks.
At first it’s the waiting in between the tests — the gap between that first scan and the GP appointment. Then it’s the wait for the specialist. Then it’s the wait for the results of the test the specialist sends me on. Then it’s the wait for surgery (scheduled for Valentine’s day). Then it’s the wait for a month after surgery for those results to come in. During all of that time I had no idea if I had cancer or just something benign that I could walk away from with an interesting story later. (I’m a writer, everything can be turned into a story for later.)
And during this time my mind worked overtime. I made contingency plans for all eventualities. I’d seen enough friends in this very situation to know how it could go. Some have had mastectomies. Some have had breast reconstruction. Some had lumpectomies… I even gave my character, Beth a double mastectomy because it was a friend’s experience. Life choices were being evaluated. Plans for the future were being considered. I suddenly had to face how I felt about my breasts. Did I like them enough to want to keep them if the news was bad? Did I want implants? Would I want preventative surgery? How would that affect my view of myself, my sexuality, my husband’s view of me? (He insisted he didn’t care as long as he has me, and to this day I believe him.)
And the thing is, I didn’t know if I had cancer yet. I was in a limbo where I didn’t really want to tell anyone, because what would I tell them? Firstly, why worry people? And secondly, I have a number of acquaintances — and sadly, family members — who revel in illness, and I couldn’t bear the thought of them speculating over my situation. This was my problem, not something that I wanted people getting a vicarious, morbid thrill from. I refused to be the subject of gleeful awfulizing over someone’s morning coffee and cake. (I know I’m not the only one who knows people who do this.)
My husband knew, of course, and a few other close friends who I felt I could trust. My friends who’d been through this were the first to understand this waiting period of awfulness. They understood the thing that I didn’t before — which is that a lot of the decision making and processing over the whole thing, goes on at this stage. Some of it’s subconscious, some of it happens over rambling late-night conversations over wine with trusted people who’ll listen.
During the time in between tests and waiting for results and surgery, I firmly decided that I wanted to do the three years of global travel and house-sitting that my husband and I had talked about. We travelled to New Zealand for a week to research a novel, we had friends visit from Japan. I finished writing a book, and we completed the first official house-sit of our three-year project to see if we were going to enjoy it enough to do it full-time.
I did all of this while still knowing that I might have to put everything on hold for treatment and surgery, but refusing to sit and wait. It’s during this time that I came to completely understand one friend’s desire to renovate her kitchen while waiting for her results and another’s desire to leave a marriage and start a new relationship. Life has to go on. Or else.
And I was managing. We — my husband and I — were managing well, until one afternoon three days after my carbon biopsy. I was still woozy from pain medication and anaesthesia when a friend called and immediately demanded, “Do you have your results yet?”
She may as well have smacked me with a shovel.
Before I found myself in this situation, I never would have seen this question as a bad one. In fact, to my shame, I’d previously asked friends going through this ordeal the very same question. But hearing it in that moment, I realised how truly shitty a question it is.
Why? Because anyone going through this ordeal knows when they’ll get their results and the minute they do, they’ll tell the people they want to, when they want to. This isn’t the time for a friend or family member to be looking to alleviate their own discomfort by demanding — or even politely requesting — things move faster, or wanting answers. This isn’t the time for them at all.
My friend’s question forced me to confront the fact I was in limbo, that I was terrified, that I had weeks until my specialist appointment when I’d hear if I had cancer and if my life would be put on hold. I went through all of this in a flash — the horrible realisation of my situation and how powerless I was to do anything about it. And while all this was happening, I was having to explain to my friend that my results weren’t coming in for another three weeks. And because I love and care for her, I didn’t tell her that she’d left me in tears for the first time since the lump was first found.
I immediately called another friend who’d recently gone into remission and apologised for ever asking her the same question. She forgave me with such kindness I started crying again, but this time because I was so lucky to have such good people around me.
How could my concerned friend have asked me about my condition in a way that would have made it okay? I’ve thought about this a lot and the only appropriate answer I’ve come up with is: “Are you okay?” If I’d said I was, then it should have been left at that. If I’d wanted to talk, then listening would have been appreciated. That’s it.
Later in the same week, I popped onto Facebook and saw a post by my husband’s cousin about breast cancer. It was in the vein of, “A lot of people don’t think about how many women die from breast cancer ever year, but I do, and I bet no one is going to share this,” with a picture of a woman who’d visibly just gone through chemo, holding her child.
My first thought was “Screw you.” I’ve always hated posts like these, but in that moment I saw them for the virtue signalling crap they are. I understand on one level that reposting stuff like this can be reflexive — a part of a “my friend put this up and I’ll look insensitive if I don’t forward it” peer pressure — but I assure you, anyone who forwards this kind of thing isn’t doing anyone playing the cancer-result-waiting-game any favours. Just. No. I still have trouble thinking kindly about the guy. He’s a big-hearted person who genuinely cares about people, so I’m sure he didn’t intend on that being the result.
So what were my results?
I don’t have cancer. According to my specialist, who made a point to lean across his desk and give me an emphatic lecture, I am an “extremely lucky” woman given all the previous test results and evidence he’d first been presented with. The tone of the conversation implied that if I wasn’t grateful for the giant gift I’d just been given — something the woman who’d attended the appointment before me hadn’t been granted — I was an idiot.
Because of my brush with cancer, I tweaked my novel before it was published in January 2020 to reflect that awful first bit, before my character’s diagnosis. I decided that I was definitely going to commit to the three years of travel with my husband. I decided to get rid of all the unnecessary baggage from my life, and I was going to think very strongly about the language I used from that day forward when talking to anyone facing a life changing illness. And I was going to be grateful for the life I’ve been given, because as I assured my specialist, I’m not an idiot.
