[dlaxague]

Brenda and Mary Jo,

I'm of course not glad to hear that you're feeling down, and I send you many good thoughts and prayers for improvement.

But at the same time - I'm really glad that you posted with honesty. I think that it's seductive for us (cancer survivors) to believe that we must hold ourselves up to an unrealistic standard of perkiness and optimism, at all times. But life, cancer or no cancer, is full of ups and downs and really - there's no benefit to denying or trying to fluff up the downs.

Of course we don't want to get stuck there, in the downs. Knowing when we're stuck is probably the trickiest part. But if we do not acknowledge, share, and allow the downs, we are denying part of life. I think it's NORMAL to be in the depths sometimes. I think that if we allow ourselves to go there, rather than trying to fluff ourselves up and put on the happy face, we can move through those depths and emerge a little more worn but deeper/wiser/richer, and ready to carry on.

Even better, if we have a place to talk about the doldrums (like right here), and if we have others who understand and do not try to fix us but rather simply hold us with love and empathy - again I think that we move through and onward, rather than around, the pain. If we try to move around it, avoiding it, suppressing it, telling ourselves we shouldn't be allowing it - then it doesn't go away, it festers.

I know that many do not want to post anything that is not upbeat, for fear of bringing others down. But speaking only for myself - there is nothing that brings me down faster, if I'm not feeling perky, than reading how wonderfully perky someone else is. Does that make sense? I'm glad that things are going well of course, for that person. But if I feel like I'm the only one who is on a downbeat, it only sends me lower.

Thank you, Mary Jo, for starting this discussion, and thank you, Brenda for chiming in. Keep talking and keep describing. And also, be patient with your body. Think how many times in life you've felt crummy but told yourself that it wasn't "real" - that it was all in your head. And then remember when you finally did feel better - how clear it was to you that you'd been physically not well. We play such mind games with ourselves.

I believe that if we honor our sadness/fatigue/fear by allowing ourselves to go there, we find that it's not as bad a place to be as we thought. I believe that we emerge more grounded, with more appreciation for this life that we're in.

But as I said in the beginning - the trickiest part is knowing if we're stuck in the doldrums. I've never gotten stuck myself, but I've talked to others who have and they report that they sunk so low that they had no strength nor even desire to move forward. That's okay for a day or even a week, but not for much longer, unless we note movement forward even if not yet upward. I guess that we could warn our loved ones - most of us have people around us. Tell them that we're feeling down and that if we don't seem better in a week, push us to get help? That sounds pretty safe - sort of a safety net or air gauge as we allow descent?

Debbie Laxague