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American Cancer Society, Barrys Big Dipper, Birches, Breast Cancer Treatment, cancer like a roller-coaster, Cancer-caused Depression, carnie, confronting mortality, Dana Jennings, depression, fatigue, hormones, identity, Learning to Fly, Northern Ireland, Portrush, power of stories, Prostate cancer, PTSD, Recovery, Robert Frost, taboo, Tom Petty, Words of Wisdom, Writing
roll·er coast·er
noun \ˈrō-lər-ˌkō-stər, ˈrō-lē-ˌkō-\
Definition of ROLLER COASTER
1. A steep, sharply curving elevated railway with small open passenger cars that is operated at high speeds as a ride, especially in an amusement park.
2. An action, event, or experience marked by abrupt, extreme change in circumstance, quality, or behavior.
You. Have. Cancer.
A cliché comes next – a roller-coaster ride. You know its refrain. First, the arduous climb towards brilliant blue. Gradually, the anxious giggling and chatter subsides. At the top, breath suspended, you wait for the world to fall out beneath you. Then a sudden plunge at shocking speed. Might you plummet to your death? Not yet. Still more unpredictable twists and turns await, above and below. White-knuckled, you cling to the bar, only half-believing there is enough life in the click-clacking, old machinery to set you back on solid ground. Suddenly it is over. You are free to return to the midway, albeit a little green around the gills and unsteady on your feet. As he helps you out of the car, you hope no one but the carnie can tell you are not as confident as you were.
Photo by Adam Shaw
In an unguarded moment, decades later, you will recollect The Big Dipper at Barry’s, closing your eyes to better see yourself, a child again hurtling through the North Atlantic air. Curls wild in the wind, mouth agape, eyes squeezed to block out light and noise and fear, and you half-hoping to stay aloft forever, because ‘coming down is the hardest thing.’ But you will land safely, startled to find yourself somewhere between Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers “Learning to Fly” and Robert Frost’s lovely “Birches“
I’d like to get away from earth awhile
And then come back to it and begin over.
May no fate willfully misunderstand me
And half grant what I wish and snatch me away
Not to return. Earth’s the right place for love:
I don’t know where it’s likely to go better.
I don’t know either.
After Cancer, Ambushed by Depression
I’m depressed.
I’m recovering well from an aggressive case of prostate cancer, I haven’t had any treatment in months, and all of my physical signposts of health are pointing in the right direction.
Still, I’m depressed.
And I’ve been ambushed by it. After more than a year of diagnosis, treatment and waiting, it’s almost as if, finally and unexpectedly, my psyche heaved a sigh and gave itself permission to implode.
I’m not alone in this cancer-caused depression. As many as 25 percent of cancer patients develop depression, according to the American Cancer Society. That’s contrasted with about 7 percent of the general population.
This isn’t about sadness or melancholy. It’s more profound than that. Broadly, I have a keen sense of being oppressed, as if I were trapped, wrapped up in some thick fog coming in off the North Atlantic.
To be more specific, I’m exhausted, unfocused and tap my left foot a lot in agitation. I don’t much want to go anywhere – especially anyplace that’s crowded – and some days I can’t even bear the thought of picking up the phone or changing a light bulb. All of this is often topped off by an aspirin-proof headache.
The fatigue frustrates me most. When I envision myself it’s as a body in motion, walking or running, not foundering in bed. On one recent day, I slept till 10 in the morning – getting 11 hours of sleep – then took a nap from noon to 2. And I was still tired.
I’ve had occasional depression over the years, but nothing as dogged as this. When I first learned that I had prostate cancer, I wondered about depression. But after the shock of the diagnosis wore off, I was sharp and clear-headed. I wasn’t depressed as I went through treatment — surgery, radiation and hormone therapy. I was buoyed by a kind of illness-induced adrenaline.
The bone-smoldering fatigue arrived in late spring/early summer, and intensified as summer deepened. I thought that I might be depressed, but resisted the diagnosis, didn’t want to countenance the idea that I could be depressed after all of my treatment.
I stubbornly chalked the fatigue up to the lingering aftereffects of radiation and my fluctuating levels of testosterone. But I was wrong.
I am seeing a psychiatrist who specializes in cancer patients, and have started a course of medication. My doctor assures me that depression isn’t unusual among those who are on the far side of treatment.
Partly, I think, I’m grieving for the person I was before I learned I had cancer. Mortality is no longer abstract, and a certain innocence has been lost.
And while the physical trauma is past, the stress lingers and brings with it days washed in fine shades of gray. In the same way that radiation has a half-life, stress does, too. We all ache to be the heroes of our own tales, right? Well, I’m not feeling too heroic these days.
Cancer pushes lots of difficult buttons. It lays bare our basic vulnerability and underlines the uncertainty of this life. And prostate cancer attacks our culture’s ideal of manhood. The steely-eyed Marlboro Man isn’t expected to worry about incontinence and erectile dysfunction.
Cancer feels bleaker than other diseases. Even though my health keeps improving, and there’s a good chance that I’m cancer free, I still feel stalked, as if the cancer were perched on my shoulder like some unrepentant imp.
It’s harder to write about the weight of depression than it is to write about prostate cancer and its physical indignities. Cancer is clear biological bad luck. But depression, no matter how much we know about it, makes part of me feel as if it’s somehow my fault, that I’m guilty of something that I can’t quite articulate.
This has also been a difficult post to write because during my dark waltz with cancer I’ve depended on my natural optimism and my sense of humor to help see me through. But depression blunts those traits.
In the end, though, I believe in and trust in the healing power of the stories that we tell each other. And I wouldn’t be truthful to you or myself if I ignored the fact that I’m depressed even as I wait for a brisk wind billowing out of the north that’ll blow this fog of mine away.
You’ve described my psyche as I recover from breast cancer. I wonder how much of the fog is from the post traumatic stress and how much is from chemo brain.
I wonder, too. I’m sorry.
Oh Yvonne I can SO relate to this! Just as he mentions above, I was on a kind of high post-diagnosis and during all my surgeries too. I was NOT depressed then, and I found it odd how “well” I seemed to be taking all this cancer business. It has only been the past 24 hours (will explain more in my next blog post) that I realize the full impact of what I’ve been through has hit, now that my surgeries are behind me. I honestly did not recognize it as depression, but that is what it is!
I could write for hours on this topic… Thank you for reading my mind and for sharing this man’s story. I am sorry that you are feeling this way too. You are definitely NOT alone.
xoxo
Oh, Renn, I so get what you’re saying about “how well you seem to be taking all this cancer business,” which is reinforced when other people tell you how strong you are and how well you look and how you have this thing beat etc etc For a while there, I almost had myself convinced that cancer was no big deal, which of course is spectacularly wrong!
The blogosphere has become a soft place to fall for so many of us. Heartbreaking to think of those who are doing this alone.
xx
That was an excellent post today. Thanks so much for sharing it. I
really enjoyed reading it very much. I’ll be sure to pass it along to others.
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No, you are not alone. I’m right there with ya, and I’m glad (?) Renn is with us too. Not that I’d wish this on anyone–as if the diagnosis & treatments aren’t bad enough, to deal with depression too is just plain mean–but if we have to endure it, thank goodness we have other like-minded, wonderful women with whom we can share the burden. I love Dana Jennings’s writing, and I’m so glad you reminded me how much his words resonate, just as yours do. Sending lots of love to you today (and to you, too, Renn!).
Nancy, it’s so true. And how do we even begin to describe the bond between all these kind, funny, scarred women about whom we know so much, whom we might never meet nor even recognize if we passed them on the street. I am very, very thankful for each and every one of you.
Thank you … and Renn, too.
dear yvonne,
i agree with pinkunderbelly – on top of everything else “…to deal with depression too is just plain mean…” i can so relate to the rollercoaster ride and those feelings both you and dana jennings speak of. just lately i feel as if i am going stark-raving mad, crying at the drop of a hat, being so angry i want to punch something HARD, having flashbacks to the initial diagnosis, treatment that i was FINE with when it was happening, but now haunt me and make me feel so naive; after what i thought i had accomplished by answering the call to revisit the journey, find out who and what i am today, and make some semblence of sense of where i fit and what fits me, it’s all just a horrible jumble of going foward, feeling more peaceful, then regressing back onto the roller coaster. i don’t think i am depressed – yet. but it could happen…and it looms as a very heavily seeded dark cloud that coud rain down and drown me. i will take this post, renn’s and pink’s comments to heart, and i send you all my thanks and…
much love, xoxo,
karen, TC
Oh, Karen. I am so sorry. I have read and re-read your story. Why wouldn’t you feel angry and cheated and duped and bitter? I would imagine it is very hard to forgive (not the right word but it approximates it, I think) what has happened to you and your family. So many heartbreaking ironies … and the interminable waiting for that “brisk wind” to blow the fog away forever.
Thinking about you today,
y
dear yvonne,
thank you for your kind words, and thank you for thinking of me. yes, i must really try not to be so hard on myself, and just work with the cues given to my mind and heart to continue to work through all the tough stuff. we’ve had a long stretch of feeling quite pleased with the newly found joys of life reinvented, so i think that being yanked backwards emotionally is especially painful. but i also think each time it happens and i am able to express what it’s like, i learn and grow and have some satisfaction that attendance is being paid to the work of grieving, leaning into it and honoring it as a way to be able to fully embrace not only where we’ve been but also how far we’ve come. with tears of gratitude streaming down my face, i say thank you, thank you, dear yvonne for not only giving me a safe place to slug rats into the gutter, but also for the compassion and validation you’ve been so generous to offer me.
love, XO,
karen, TC
Karen, I can’t help it … I now have an indelible image of someone I don’t know “slugging rats into the gutter” … 🙂
I hope tomorrow is better than today and that the pattern continues …
y
I remember reading Dana Jennings’ account of being ambushed by depression (ambushed is so apt a description) and being blown away by how much he described my own feelings post treatment. As cancer survivors, many of us have struggled with that unexpected feeling of depression and loneliness that surprises us after treatment is finished. I say unexpected and surprises, because for many of us we are quite often shocked and confused at the intensity of the feelings that hit us. The physical and emotional fallout of cancer treatment can contribute to feelings of anxiety and depression and I would like to see more awareness and help given to cancer survivors to prepare them to cope with this. Thanks for sharing your story – we all need to break the taboo about depression.
… and on top of it all, Marie, you and I are from a country that is loath to break a taboo.
Mind you, when I stop and think about all the information we’re initially provided (at a time when we can’t hear anything after “you have cancer”) about the physical aftermath, down to minute details about how to pencil in eyebrows that may fall out during chemotherapy, it is pretty stunning that there is very little said about even the possibility of depression or any of the “F” words (fatigue/fear) or loss of identity etc etc
Unfair, really, not to prepare patients and families for all that is likely to happen on the rollercoaster ride.
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What a wonderful post and so much I could relate to. 47 years old, mother of 2, married for over 20 years, I just got through a course of treatment where I had the “full meal deal” (double masectomy, chemo, radiation therapy, tamoxifene and a first checkups every 4 months). The clinic liberated me just before Christmas last year and I simply imploded about a month after treatment ended. Anxiety attacks and deep depression. Took time for me to get help because I just couldn’t figure out why in the hell I was feeling this way. What finally drove me to seek help was fantasies of controlled drinking. I’m a recovering alcoholic (and by definition have no control over my drinking once it starts). I ended up at a meeting and just let go – talked about how I was feeling and how I felt I was entitled to a slip or two given what I just went through. No one said a word but it was the act of voicing my thoughts that made me realize just how dangerous the situation was. Since then I’ve sought and received help and things are improving. Almost all of the tools I was given to stop drinking worked equally well when I was diagnosed: One Day at a Time, Let Go and Let God, Live in the Present. Now I’m able to start using them again though it’s a hard road back out of that pit of despair I was in just a few weeks ago.
Victoria, thank you so much for telling your story. Such healing power in the sharing of these stories, I think. Your “liberation” from the clinic just resonates with me, although sometimes I think it might be more apt to describe it as being released for good behavior! I am so sorry you went through such hell, but so glad to hear you are on your way up and out. I used to think “living in the present” was just a platitude, but I really understand now that it can be a case of minute by minute.
best to you. I’m off to visit your blog.
Terrific post – I was very moved by Dana Jennings’ reflections. Like so many, I’ve found much about the post-treatment phase more psychologically difficult than the treatment itself. Have just started a very stressful and busy new job which in a weird way has really helped (in that I’ve hardly got a second to think about cancer and am stressing about something else entirely)…but I suspect this isn’t a terribly functional or lasting ‘cure’!!
Thank you Liz. That piece by Dana Jennings just stopped me in my tracks. Who would have ever imagined the psychological and emotional impact to be more harrowing than major surgeries and poisonous treatments. I’m not sure I would have believed it if I’d been warned about it. I’m glad to hear the new job helps and hoping it’s “good” stress and business, because you certainly don’t need the other kind of stress hammering away at your recovery.
y
Robert Frost… Tom Petty… the Big Dipper at Barry’s… (and probably ‘pastie suppers down at Davy’s chipper, gravy rings, barmbracks, wagon wheels, snowballs’ as well, in spirit) — and a harrowing account of one man’s battle with the enemy of depression which awaits around every corner with a glint in its eyes. Thanks for this post Yvonne. You have a real talent for blending together the real stuff of life, whether the giddy thrills of a rollercoaster, the heartwarming heartland rock of Tom Petty, and the austere leave-stripped winter truths of Robert Frost, and the heartbreaking realities of depression. Keep at it.
Oh Keith, There is no way I can even follow “the austere leave-stripped winter truths of Robert Frost.” YOU keep at it!!!!!
Yvonne,
Thank you so much for posting this. Yes, the roller coaster ride…So much to relate to in this post, as is evident when reading through the comments.
It’s so vital to remember one is never alone. Sharing the hard stuff truly does lighten the load. I’m grateful every day for this “space” we lovingly call the blogosphere. I feel safe here, which is an odd thing considering the vulnerability we allow others to see as well.
Oh, Nancy
You are so right about not feeling alone. LIke yourself, I am just infinitely grateful for the support I have found here.
I was talking to someone about this online community the other day, and we came to the conclusion that it is more like a little neighborhood where newcomers are made to feel welcome and everybody knows every body else well enough to care.
Y