“This is an interesting feeling,” I think to myself. My broken hand is floating suspended in a metal box while being gently massaged by warm air and therapy beads. My injured muscles ache after 30 minutes of range of motion exercises. This box therapy is designed to increase the blood flow to my damaged muscles and soft tissue. My mind drifts. I am thinking about how I struggled to ask for help after cancer.
I am a fiercely independent person. From the age of 17 when I moved across the country alone, I have remained intensely self-sufficient. I am the “go-it-alone” type and have never felt comfortable asking for help.
Throughout most of my life this has been out of necessity. For the most part there simply wasn’t anyone there to offer help even if I wanted it. In order to survive I became resilient. Even during the times when help was there, I still chose to turn inward and rely on my own abilities.
My cancer journey was no different. Before my double mastectomy I spent days pre-cooking meals, cleaning the house, and getting my affairs in order. Instead of leaning on my husband (who admittedly is not the warm and fuzzy type) I decided the pre-op me would be the person who helped the post-op me.
Post operatively even on my worst of days, the days when I felt like I was drowning in a sea of misery and pain, the days when I felt so alone even sunlight looked dark, I didn’t reach out.
I suffered alone and in silence. I focused inward. I journaled. I prayed like I had never prayed before. And through it all, I didn’t reach out to my support system. Here are a few reasons why:
I felt guilty
Each time I picked up the phone and started dialing I was overwhelmed with feelings of guilt. I knew that just because my world had stopped spinning didn’t mean anyone else’s had. My friends and family have difficult jobs, children, financial hardships, and their own life struggles. I did not want to be an extra burden to them.
When I opened my mouth to ask my husband for help the words caught in my throat. I remembered that things were difficult for him too. He is not a caregiver and does not feel comfortable discussing emotion. I didn’t want to make his experience any worse that it had to be by making my burdens his.
I was ashamed and a little embarrassed
Should I have been ashamed that I got cancer at the age of 39? Of course not! Should I have been embarrassed that I wasn’t bullet proof? How ridiculous to think such things! But I did anyway.
Whether it made sense or not, I was ashamed of my broken body and embarrassed by my limitations. Talking about my illness felt like admitting a fatal flaw and left me feeling very uncomfortable.
I was in denial
Admitting I needed help was admitting that my old life, the life of independence and self-sufficiency, was truly over. That reality was not something I was ready to face. It has now been ten months since my diagnosis and I still struggle to accept that my body is different than before cancer and like it or not will always be.
I didn’t have the energy
Reaching out requires a lot of emotional energy. Connecting with others is a two-way street. I was so fatigued by my cancer battle I had nothing left over to give to someone else.
I didn’t want people to give me the “cancer eyes”
Every cancer patient knows the look. It’s the look you get when the person you are talking to is simultaneously feeling embarrassed, uncomfortable, and sorry for you all at the same time. I. Hate. That. Look. Period.
I am a private person
I have never widely shared my feelings. I do not bare my soul on social media. I open up to a select trustworthy few. Unfortunately, during my cancer battle I couldn’t even open up to my inner circle.
I didn’t want to be stigmatized at work
Like it or not doctors are expected to be superhuman. There is a very real professional stigma attached to physicians with serious health issues. I was concerned that if I widely shared my experience eventually the news would get back to the hospital.
Physicians have seen too many cancer patients with bad outcomes to be able to separate my illness from every breast cancer patient they have ever treated. My colleagues and I have seen people just like me die.
They simply can’t help but wonder whether you can still do the job or whether you are a liability. When I did reveal my cancer diagnosis to my group, within weeks my pay was cut and I was taken off regular rotation. I found out the hard way this stigma is very real.
I have an amazing group of people in my support system. More than one of them would have stopped everything and been by my side every single moment of my battle. Several would have taken leaves of absence from their jobs or flown across the country. I know this and I love them for it. I simply couldn’t have lived with myself if I had asked it of them.
And so I fought the battle mostly alone. Should I have done that? Probably not. I certainly know if the tables were turned, I would want to opportunity to support a friend. Providing that support would be no burden to me. Love is patient and kind after all.
All too often I diagnose my patients with cancer in the hospital. With heart aching I sit with them and talk about the importance of self care and support systems. I know this makes me a bit of a hypocrite. I only wish I could extend the same limitless empathy and love I have for others to myself.
With a buzz the therapy box rumbles to a halt and I snap back to the present. I stare across the bustling gym at all of the broken people just like me. I hear the clink of weights and hum of equipment. I see grimaces of pain and jaws set with determination. I wonder how many of them are having similar thoughts at this very moment.
I remove my hand from the box, examine the deep purple bruises, and sigh. Someday I will help others like me. Someday I will reach out to them in their time of need. Someday I will be the sunshine in someone else’s dark night…but not today. Today I am the one needing help, if only I could be brave enough to ask.
