No man is an island, and realizing this when facing the challenges life throws at us is an essential survival skill. Here Chris Bateman, Biznews contributor and news curator, talks about his experience of Ubuntu in dealing with his esophageal cancer diagnosis and treatment. The series was first published by HASA.
In case you missed Episode 1, click here.
Hi, I’m Chris Bateman, and this is the second podcast about my cancer survivor apprenticeship. If you missed out on my personal profile in my first podcast, I’m primarily a freelance healthcare journalist by trade, a husband and father to two pre-teenage daughters, a fly-fisherman, and a survivor of esophageal cancer. At the time of recording this podcast, (February 27th 2020), I was three months into chemo treatment, having been diagnosed in November, 2019.
I want to talk about how my family, friends and even virtual strangers have rallied to support our family unit of four, morally, spiritually and pragmatically. Luckily by dint of my upbringing, profession and personal choice, I err on the side of transparency. So, for me, there’s been no skulking in dark corners, hiding my cancer ‘secret,’ from others or justifying that kind of behavior by saying I don’t want to ‘burden’ others with the news. I firmly believe these are unhealthy choices which deny survivors of any trauma, anywhere, the deep well of good-will and selfless support available out there. Not to mention real empathy; wherever you find yourself, physically and emotionally, someone else has been there, I promise you. It’s part of the human condition.
I was brought to tears by a good friend of ours simply telling my wife that she lights a candle for me every morning. I grew up in the Catholic tradition of lighting candles for people, (obviously other traditions also do this), but I never really ‘got it,’ until now. Another friend and neighbor gets suppers delivered to us on chemo treatment days. These can be busy, stressful days for my wife Suzanne who has to double up on school trips and transporting me to and from Blaauwberg Netcare Hospital – in between teaching extra-maths to local matric kids. In the mostly Afrikaans-speaking Durbanville community… food, its preparation and consumption, is the glue that holds community together. Random acquaintances and friends often pitch up at our front door with a lasagne, chicken or beef dish, easily frozen, but delicious fresh.
I’m constantly reminded of several of the many reasons I married my wife; her grounded pragmatism, razor-sharp mind and memory, and ability to get things done regardless of the odds. She forgives easily and shoulders burdens without complaint. She’s also one of those people whose calmness is in inverse proportion to how hairy things get. Examples include my daughter shivering in a fever, and her not panicking when I spooked several burglar’s downstairs in our home while fetching a 5am baby’s bottle. Or calmly undoing a tangled nest of trout-fly-line in our canoe while I battled the monster trout on the end of it. Not qualities I would list as among my greatest.
People’s reactions to cancer have fascinated me. They range from telling you well-meaning stories about their friend who survived Stage 1V cancer, to treating you like a rare piece of fragile china. Some people are uncomfortable talking about it, or avoid it altogether, others ask you outright if you’re going to die. I think views are strongly influenced by one’s own experience of cancer, however limited. We all make up stories and often readily believe myths in the absence of facts and in the face of vastly differing individual diagnoses. This forms the tint on our lenses. Again, it’s part of the human condition. Just how unpredictable and different this renders people’s responses is illustrated by my own two daughters and wife when I first broke the news to them.
I’ll let you hear it from directly from them;
First Suz, my wife.
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Suz and I thrashed out when we’d break the news to our daughters, plus my parents and her widowed mum. Our main dilemma was risking disturbing the focus of our daughters during stress-inducing year-end exams versus chancing that they’d inadvertently find out from our closer friends whose children are their school mates. A similar theme applied to our parents. As a journalist I know only too well how thick and fast the grapevine can be. Luckily the exams were over in a matter of days and our kids heard from us first. We sat them down at the end of our bed one early weekend morning and stuck to the basic message I shared in my first podcast. In other words; ‘Stage one, curable, treatable cancer.’ Here’s how Hannah, our 11-year-old experienced it;
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And here’s Kate, our 9-year-old;
“……………..”
As you can see; as different as chalk is from cheese, illustrating what happens as the news ripples outwards in your social and family circle.
There are people though, who calmly and confidentially absorb everything you tell them in great detail – and then get on with the job of walking beside you, directing and advising your healing.
These are nearly always the medical professionals, ranging from chemotherapy nurses, their pharmacy assistants, oncologists, surgeons, physicians, audiologists and psychologists – even individual medical scheme case managers who can help ease the burden of managing your treatment finances.
My experience has been overwhelmingly positive – if you ignore the nursing shortages in private hospitals impacting on the quality of patient-centric care by junior staff. The most helpful advice I was able to use from the 20 cancer survivors I interviewed was this; keep a single, central file with all your essential medical documents in it and take it with you (or the event-specific documentation), wherever you go. You are the ultimate guardian of your health. Discovery Health Medical Scheme has the high-tech healthcare-provider equivalent of such a file, a digital platform with your full medical history and current profile accessible to all your (participating) professional caregivers, called Health ID. It mitigates the vagaries of human memory, (especially for elderly patients), reduces and mostly prevents prescription drug clashes, putting participants on the same page. I took the trouble to authorize all my caregivers to share my information, (although some are not registered and unable to participate, I still feel it was worth it). My oncologist, GP and audiologist, at least, are now instantly connected when it comes to my holistic care.
I’d also say; don’t treat your doctors as mini-Gods, ask questions and participate in your own care while obviously respecting their expertise, skill and experience. I don’t think I’m alone in putting greater trust in somebody who has an excellent bedside manner and really seems to care – though I admit this is not exactly scientific. I was in a position as a health journalist to check out the credentials of my doctors and hear from their peers, though this hardly makes me unique; you can do nearly all of this via the internet.
Talking of bedside manner, I’ve invented a more cancer-appropriate term. Chill-chair-chatter – or Lazy-Boy lounger-lingering. I’m specifically referring to the GoodHopeOncology chemo nursing crew at Blaauwberg Netcare Hospital in Parklands from where you can view Table Mountain across the bay. I’ve spent 30 hours there over the past three or so months (10 chemo sessions of some three hours each). That’s time enough to get to know your nursing sisters fairly well.
The chemo room consists of five Lazy-Boy lounger chairs alongside individual drip stands in a well-lit room with a central nursing station occupied by Sister Wendy Kopman and her senior nurse assistant, Caroline ………Wendy is a street-wise, sports-mad, straight-talking, light-hearted beacon of hope and humor. Caroline is more subtle, a gentle, soft-handed, big-hearted, vocation-driven carer. Backing them up is Sister Saba ……the sunny-dispositioned on-site pharmacist who ensures patients get and correctly take any chemo-related meds they might need, be it for nausea, rashes, headaches, or reflux. I call her the drug queen, an obtuse reference to her having been born in the same country as Freddy Mercury, (Iran). The combined effect this team has on patients reflects in the hugs, jokes and warmth of survivors who pop in to see them, chatting up a storm. The chemo room is rendered vibrant, a space for authenticity and sharing, by dint of the staff’s way of being and caring. I’ve seen the most challenged survivor struggling emotionally, emerge from their chemo session with a smile on her face.
Here’s an example of Wendy’s forthright banter; On my very first day of entering the chemo room, she quips as I unknowingly pass her; “Ja, Mr Bateman, you were full of nonsense on the phone to me the other day, now you creep in here as quiet as mouse, hey?’ My earlier instinctive warming to her as we joked on the phone was instantly enhanced. This might even be fun, I thought.
I’ve come to look forward to the alternating peace and quiet, intimate sharing and sometimes dark humor jokes that typify the chemo room. It’s a place of authenticity and often unspoken support from fellow survivors. The empathy is tangible and forms a special camradie that says; ‘we’re all in this together,” while asking the question, “how can we make the best of it?”
In my next Podcast I’ll reflect on my impending major op, due after this current 3-month chemo stint, my fears around it and how I’m drawing on the courage and attitudes I’ve seen my fellow survivors display. I’ll also share the insights I’ve had using dream work, journaling and learned personal growth-enhancing skills, not the least of which was a very exposing imagined conversation I had with my anesthetist. They say we treat doctors like gods; well I’ve realized I wasn’t bargaining with my anesthetist and surgeon about the outcome of my operation; I was bargaining with God. Chat more about that in the next podcast. Cheers for now.
Click here for Episode 3.
