What I want you to know about my breast cancer
Finding strength in presence: A cancer patient's letter to loved ones
To Those I Love—
Your job is to show up and check your baggage at the door. Your relationship with me hasn't changed, but in so many ways, it has. I may have been your pillar of strength before, but I need you to be mine now.
This is scary, but it's scarier for me than it is for you. A natural reaction to things that are difficult or frightening is to withdraw and rationalize reasons why this person doesn't really need us or doesn't want to hear from us.
I do.
And if I don't, I won't answer the phone. It's still important that you called.
The best phone calls I have received are the ones where we didn't even talk about cancer—just ordinary, everyday things. They made me feel normal. Sometimes, I am more afraid of bringing everyone else down, so it's your job to show me that you're stronger than that. Show me that my cancer won't end our relationship.
The hardest part about going through cancer treatment isn't the treatment itself: the chemo, the surgery, the radiation, and everything else. It is sometimes feeling like I am going through this alone or, worse, seeing how my cancer is hurting my friends and family.
Look up Crisis, Ring Theory (Psychology Today).
You don't have to understand everything. Your job is simply to show up.
