I did chemo. I did three rounds of FEC and three of Taxotere. I’ve been taking tamoxifen for over a month now. I did not question the need for the chemo. Reading your post today I have to ask myself why I didn’t ask those questions. I think the biggest reason was the relationship I have with my oncologist and the way the clinic organized my treatment. They spent a lot of time with me in the beginning explaining what was going using terms I could understand which got us off to a very good start. After the surgery and before the chemo I had a consultation with one of the chemo nurses which lasted well over an hour. And they were true to their word – everything happened as they said it would. And during the chemo they took great care to see to my comfort – all of the side effects were taken seriously and treated quickly. I guess over the months I underwent treatment I came to trust them implicitly. Perhaps some might think that foolish but it works for me.
I am all the more grateful because they must have had some questions about me above and beyond the cancer. I’m a 47 year old American immigrant living here in France (been here for nearly 20 years) and French is my second language. I am also a recovering alcoholic and there was always the possibility of relapse during the stress of the diagnosis and treatment. I was also concerned (unnecessarily it turned out) that because of my status as an immigrant and not a citizen that people would look at me and say, “Another immigrant here to mooch off our national healthcare system.” Never happened but it was a fear of mine in the beginning even though I have lived and worked and paid taxes here for many years.
So glad to hear you had such a supportive oncologist from the beginning – it sounds like your team anticipated every question you might have had so you didn’t need to ask.
Isn’t it odd how, invariably, the things we fear the most are the least likely to happen?? I’m an immigrant too, except in America and from Ireland. I suppose my second language is American and my third is breast-cancer-awareness-industry 🙂
I read your reply and I was so wishing I could sit down with you and swap stories about the “immigrant experience.” And I laughed when you said your second language was American. It’s true – it’s not the same. Most of the English speakers I know here are from across the Channel and we laugh a lot because sometimes we really don’t understand each other as well as we think we ought to. It’s also a kick to hear someone say, “I just love your accent, darling.” I suspect you get some of that too. 🙂
I hear what you are saying about fear. You’re absolutely right. when I was diagnosed I did a bit of what a friend of mine calls “living in the wreckage of the future.” None of it came to pass. The French sometimes have a reputation for being a bit cold and distant. Like all stereotypes, it’s not true. I’m still floored by how kind people are. Yesterday I was doing service at my church and a woman I didn’t know approached me. She wanted to know my name. I’m part of a group called Notre Dame de Lourdes and I want to add your name to the list of people we pray for, she said, and you will be in my prayers as well. I cried and I was so grateful for that out of the blue gift she gave me.
I just keep reading and rereading your friend’s remark about fear, “living in the wreckage of the future.” I can’t think of a better way to describe it. She nailed it.
Like you, I have been touched by the kindness of strangers so many times. My mother (still in Ireland) has friends at her church who have added my name to their prayer lists. Even though I do not go to church myself, I am deeply moved by and appreciate such kindness.
Ah. The immigrant experience. The older I get, the more I write about it. There’s something very special about the immigrant spirit that is often lost in the larger debate about immigration – especially here in Arizona.
Y, it’s hard to believe that was a year ago. The daily minutia seems to slowly erase the uncertainty of your decisions in the minds of others even when they see you most every day for a year, and I wonder; how hard it must be for you when the passage of time doesn’t do that for you. D
Oh, D … right now it feels like a million years ago, but tomorrow it might feel like it was just yesterday or, bizarrely, like it never happened at all! The last is probably because of all those little routines that do such a good job camouflaging whatever it is that ails us, right???
Miss you
Those are the kinds of graphs I hate to look at.
I did chemo. I did three rounds of FEC and three of Taxotere. I’ve been taking tamoxifen for over a month now. I did not question the need for the chemo. Reading your post today I have to ask myself why I didn’t ask those questions. I think the biggest reason was the relationship I have with my oncologist and the way the clinic organized my treatment. They spent a lot of time with me in the beginning explaining what was going using terms I could understand which got us off to a very good start. After the surgery and before the chemo I had a consultation with one of the chemo nurses which lasted well over an hour. And they were true to their word – everything happened as they said it would. And during the chemo they took great care to see to my comfort – all of the side effects were taken seriously and treated quickly. I guess over the months I underwent treatment I came to trust them implicitly. Perhaps some might think that foolish but it works for me.
I am all the more grateful because they must have had some questions about me above and beyond the cancer. I’m a 47 year old American immigrant living here in France (been here for nearly 20 years) and French is my second language. I am also a recovering alcoholic and there was always the possibility of relapse during the stress of the diagnosis and treatment. I was also concerned (unnecessarily it turned out) that because of my status as an immigrant and not a citizen that people would look at me and say, “Another immigrant here to mooch off our national healthcare system.” Never happened but it was a fear of mine in the beginning even though I have lived and worked and paid taxes here for many years.
So glad to hear you had such a supportive oncologist from the beginning – it sounds like your team anticipated every question you might have had so you didn’t need to ask.
Isn’t it odd how, invariably, the things we fear the most are the least likely to happen?? I’m an immigrant too, except in America and from Ireland. I suppose my second language is American and my third is breast-cancer-awareness-industry 🙂
I read your reply and I was so wishing I could sit down with you and swap stories about the “immigrant experience.” And I laughed when you said your second language was American. It’s true – it’s not the same. Most of the English speakers I know here are from across the Channel and we laugh a lot because sometimes we really don’t understand each other as well as we think we ought to. It’s also a kick to hear someone say, “I just love your accent, darling.” I suspect you get some of that too. 🙂
I hear what you are saying about fear. You’re absolutely right. when I was diagnosed I did a bit of what a friend of mine calls “living in the wreckage of the future.” None of it came to pass. The French sometimes have a reputation for being a bit cold and distant. Like all stereotypes, it’s not true. I’m still floored by how kind people are. Yesterday I was doing service at my church and a woman I didn’t know approached me. She wanted to know my name. I’m part of a group called Notre Dame de Lourdes and I want to add your name to the list of people we pray for, she said, and you will be in my prayers as well. I cried and I was so grateful for that out of the blue gift she gave me.
I just keep reading and rereading your friend’s remark about fear, “living in the wreckage of the future.” I can’t think of a better way to describe it. She nailed it.
Like you, I have been touched by the kindness of strangers so many times. My mother (still in Ireland) has friends at her church who have added my name to their prayer lists. Even though I do not go to church myself, I am deeply moved by and appreciate such kindness.
Ah. The immigrant experience. The older I get, the more I write about it. There’s something very special about the immigrant spirit that is often lost in the larger debate about immigration – especially here in Arizona.
Y, it’s hard to believe that was a year ago. The daily minutia seems to slowly erase the uncertainty of your decisions in the minds of others even when they see you most every day for a year, and I wonder; how hard it must be for you when the passage of time doesn’t do that for you. D
Oh, D … right now it feels like a million years ago, but tomorrow it might feel like it was just yesterday or, bizarrely, like it never happened at all! The last is probably because of all those little routines that do such a good job camouflaging whatever it is that ails us, right???
Miss you