Don’t ask if you don’t want me to tell
Apparently, when one has been undergoing chemo and radiation, it is not wise for one to stay up until midnight (despite how reasonable it seems at 11:30 in the evening). Today I was tired, but okay. I’ve been taking prophylactic Compazine, so the nausea from the radiation is relatively minimal. It’s 8:30p and I plan to be in bed within the next 30 minutes. (Making up for lost sleep.)
As I have mentioned previously, I have a PhD in Social psychology (of course, we all know that PhD stands for ‘piled high and deep’). Social psychology investigates how the individual functions within a society. One area of interest to social psychologists is the influence of social norms on behavior. Think of social norms as the (often) unwritten rules of a society. For example, when we see someone we know walking toward us, we often acknowledge them by asking how they are doing.
It makes us uncomfortable when someone violates a social norm. Think of how you would feel if someone jumped in front of you in line without permission or wore a banana suit out in public for no apparent reason. When I taught social psychology in academia, I would have my students intentionally violate social norms and observe how people reacted. In particular, I told them that when someone asked them how they were doing, to stop the person and really tell them how they were feeling (e.g., tell them about the bad nights sleep they had gotten, or the bad traffic on the way into school, or how they were not feeling well that day). Universally, the students would report that the people to whom they had given detailed description acted as if they were really uncomfortable, often looking for a quick way to end the conversation (give this a try yourself…you may be surprised by the results).
Anywho, what does this have to do with me and cancer? I’m glad you asked. Several weeks ago, a colleague of mine passed me in the hall and asked me how I was doing. I gave a non-committal answer which she took to mean that something was up (well, duh!). She asked what was up and I told her she didn’t really want to know. She persisted that she did, and I persisted that she didn’t. She persisted some more, so I told her that I had been recently diagnosed with pancreas cancer.
The blood drained from her face and she was visibly shaken. (She thought something was up, but she didn’t know it was something of that magnitude.) I then spent 15 or so minutes telling her about what had happened and what I was going to do. She asked all the typical questions (e.g., How was I feeling? How was MB handling things? What did we tell the kids? What is the prognosis? etc.). By the end of our discussion she had tears running down her cheeks (and I’m sure she wished she had said something like, “Nice to see you Merle” instead).
I did try to make my colleague feel better for having asked the question and felt badly that I had upset her. As another friend of mine described it, what I had done was say, “I have this really bad form of cancer; are YOU doing okay with it?” I truly don’t like to upset people and so I often do not talk about my cancer unless someone else brings it up. Some people have gotten over the initial shock and have even begun giving me guff about not being 100% (“Oh there goes Merle, playing the ‘cancer’ card again!”) But in the end, I think the moral of the story is: if you do not really mean to ask someone how they are doing, perhaps you should acknowledge them in a different way.
Merle
Hi Merle,
You are very right about the “how are you” questions but I wanted to add one other thing. I think that when people know that you or someone you love has a serious medical condition they think that they should always be asking about us. But what people forget is that sometimes we have forgotten about it for the moment and that question brings you right back. Sometimes it’s OK to not ask all the time. It’s OK to just be the same as if there was nothing going on. What people in the cancer world lack is the “normal” life they used to have and they know they can never truly return to it. It’s such a relief to just be “normal” sometimes. No questions asked.
Funny, I actually did that social norms experiment back in college. We looked directly at people in an elevator rather than the floor numbers. We got some very interesting reactions.
Take care,
Amy in Baltimore
Good morning, Merle!
I loved your blog today. It struck so many strings for my own experience. And not just the one that our Psych professor told me about what PhD stands for only his hierarchy went something like this:
We all know what BS stands for, MS is more of the same and PhD is Piled Higher and Deeper.
I loved that explanation! I thought what a great guy to be able to joke about his achievements and title in that way.
I am with you in that I don’t believe most people really mean it when they say, ‘how are you today?’ Although I am fortunate enough to work at the American Cancer Society and see people almost daily that ask how I’m doing today. They actually STOP what they are doing when they ask. I believe they sincerely are concerned – at least most of them are. As it becomes more obvious to others that you are going through the journey – I believe people will ask and be truly sincere in their asking.
I like to use my responses as a way to open the door to educate people about the form of cancer I have. I am not sure what that makes me – I like the term ambassador (did I spell that right? it doesn’t look right…hmmm), but not sure that I would have ever signed up to be an ovarian cancer ambassador on my own. There is so much that folks don’t know and I am certain that your friend who you might have overwhelmed a bit with your response to a casual question – really does care.
Just remember Merle, it’s okay for people to be upset by what we are going through. It’s a natural response – it’s our job as survivors to get through it by any means necessary. You keep your chin up and always remember that there are those of us out here that KNOW what you are going through because we’ve walked on a similar bed of coals you’re finding yourself on now.
Keep on writing!
Rhonda