such an insensitive line in C is for courage.

rainbow dash

Sun, Mar 16 2014, 5:26 pm

In this weeks family first in the article C is for courage I found this line highly insensitive.' Sheesh! They need to lighten up - its just cancer.'
My mother died of cancer at age 42. I was 15,as did 5 other family members die from this dreaded illness.

You could say that about a cold, but CANCER?????? So many people die of it every year. I find it so insensitive that it put me off reading the magazine.

Being that she is a nurse she should of known better then to say or even write something like this.And shame on Mishpacha for printing it.

I would love to hear what Esty Bloom has to say about that.

I feel like writing another letter to the editor about this.

Last edited by rainbow dash on Mon, Mar 17 2014, 7:11 am; edited 1 time in total

Liba

Sun, Mar 16 2014, 5:45 pm

Let me preface this by saying, I didn't see the article in question. I sympathise with your reaction to the line you wrote, but I also think I understand where the author is coming from as well.

Sometimes when people are going through them, they make light even of serious things. If you don't laugh you have to cry and laughing is more comfortable.

I was at a consult with a surgeon who wanted to do less of a surgery than the first two surgeons I had consulted with. I asked him why, and he said "I am not going to answer that since you won't understand anyway." My reply to that was to laugh. I am an intelligent and informed patient, so his answer seemed absurd to me. His response to my laughter was "this isn't funny, it is cancer!" and that had me laughing so hard I had tears running down my face.

To this day, whenever things get too much, all anyone has to say is "this isn't funny, it is cancer" to start the laughter flowing.

Mind you, the doctor was wrong, he would have been leaving behind cancerous nodes with his abbreviated surgery. B"H I didn't go with him!

I lost my father to cancer when I was 15. I have/had cancer. My brother had cancer. My grandmother had cancer. My MIL has had two kinds of cancer, one of them two times.

I take cancer seriously, but it is only cancer. It isn't my emmunah or my kesher with HKBH. It isn't even my ability to laugh or smile. It is a nisayon, and not a pretty one, but if I had a choice I would take it over severe mental illness chv"sh or brain injury.

I am not downplaying cancer chv"sh, but if it is the nisayon I am given, I will try to get through it with a positive attitude, even if that makes it seem that I am not taking it as seriously as people on the outside would like.

Frumdoc

Sun, Mar 16 2014, 6:21 pm

I got the impression it was a self depreciating ironic comment, that did misfire.

An attempt to be funny, or utilise positive thinking, but it judt sounded judgemental rather than uplifting.

After all, the author is undergoing chemo for cancer, she knows what her experience of it is.

I think she was extrapolating her positive experience of chemo, without side effects, to the others she saw around her, and trying to lighten it up with some humor. I don't think she hit the mark, though, and it stood out to me as an insensitive comment, after all, many people don't have positive experiences of chemo and may have much poorer prognoses than her.

Write in, at least the editor will have a chance to review how they are presenting this and potentially change this for the better. I do think it's a very interesting and usually thought provoking column.

MaBelleVie

Sun, Mar 16 2014, 8:41 pm

I thought it was a line she used on herself to put herself in better state of mind, not something she ever considered saying aloud to others.

Also, I want to point out that the column is called "C is for Courage" NOT C is for cancer. The entire focus, as I've seen it, was about the author trying to turn a very challenging situation into something she can grow from. I think the line you took issue with was part of that process for her. Not everyone will handle a diagnosis the way she did, and not everyone should. This is her story.

FranticFrummie

Mon, Mar 17 2014, 4:08 am

I knew a young guy, 34 years old. He was HIV+, and his family has a history of a very aggressive form of lung cancer. Because of that, he never took up smoking - but he got the cancer anyway.

He used to joke that he was going to be the first person with AIDS in history who was going to die from something else instead. He would say stuff like "Hey, maybe I should start smoking! I mean, at this point what can it do to me?" He had a very keen sense of irony.

He passed away only 5 months after his diagnosis, but he laughed all the way to his grave, and left behind orders that his eulogies should be full of fun and happy memories. All of his hospice nurses showed up for the services, because they had grown to love him.

When it's my time, I want to go out the way he did, always seeing the bright side of things, and sharing it with others.

Liba

Mon, Mar 17 2014, 5:32 am

amother wrote:

Rainbow dash - FTR - just because other people see this differently does NOT invalidate YOUR feelings. I'm so sorry for your loss.

I don't think anyone is trying to invalidate her feelings. Her feelings are real and valid. I just trying to help her understand the authors feelings and way of coping which is also real and valid.

Hug

Dovi'smom

Mon, Mar 17 2014, 10:35 am

I'm going to chime in and also say that I read that and totally took it as a humorous reflection of the positive frame of mind she was in that day. And she was obviously not serious about cancer being 'just cancer'. I mean, she writes about her monumental struggle week after week!

Liba, that post was something special. Thanks! Refuos and yeshuos!