Of all the illnesses, many believe hearing the word “cancer” is most terrifying, like an “out of body” experience. For me, I felt like leaping off the operating table. Not even awake yet, I heard the doctor’s words—“One was nothing. The other was breast cancer.” And he whooshed out of the room.
Like any partner of a breast cancer patient, Marc Silver reminds in his book Breast Cancer Husband: How to Help Your Wife (and Yourself) through Diagnosis, Treatment and Beyond, the man in my life was inextricably conjoined in the events.
Husbands or partners of breast cancer patients find themselves emotionally worn, Silver reminds, but few people are likely to ask how he feels. All the attention falls upon the patient, and the significant other is expected to be there to help in some imprecise, but complete, way.
And few human have those “innate” tools to “rise to the occasion.”
I’d phoned my husband, working overseas, when I got the news I’d need surgery. “Could you postpone it? I’ve got a full week at work.”
Doctors had been ignoring symptoms, despite my protests, for more than a year, and I finally had had enough.
“I think not,” I replied. He hopped a plane.
As a nurse and psychologist, working for many years with all sorts of illnesses, I wasn’t surprised. Most of the time, we’re all really capable of screwing up.
In fact, when my spouse fell outside the front door a few years later, breaking his foot, I wasn’t the most heroic, either. He drove himself to the hospital the next morning, where doctors promptly advised him that my “sprain” diagnosis was off the mark.
So for both the patient and partner, now is the time to think forward, not backward, to deal with the myriad of challenges facing those who enter the world of breast cancer.
Silver lists tips to get through it, among them:
1. It’s better to listen than to advise.
For many men, though, whose role is “fixing it,” cancer comes as a challenge in which assuming the role of listener is one of the hardest. Along with her physicians, she needs to make decisions for which he can offer little more than support and patience.
2. You matter, too.
Often taught to be strong, withhold emotion, keep up with one’s profession, pay the bills, and then help with the housework and kids, the cancer husband faces a huge span of emotions, sometimes quite the opposite of what she might be feeling.
No one enjoys this new role, and often one feels like a victim. Most therapists believe it’s positive for a husband to share his sadness or his annoyance in this situation. However, anger is a different matter, and channeling emotions with rational self talk (e.g. “I don’t like this but I can stand it”), exercise, activity, and, if times get really tough, a visit or two to a therapist, individually, or as a couple.
For most breast cancer husbands, once his wife has met her doctors and they’ve devised the plan of care, anxiety will be lessened for both, but up and down as treatments progress and change.
3. You can be a big help at the doctor’s office, and all along the way.
Often the newly diagnosed patient is so shocked that it’s her partner who asks, “What’s next?” Which then, while she is bombarded with information about tumor size and stage (From One, small and no lymph involvement, all the way to Four, meaning the cancer has metastasized to other organs), estrogen receptivity, chemotherapy or not, surgical alternatives, radiation.
I know one husband who carried a tape recorder to all of his wife’s medical appointment. More than one or two physicians raised their eyebrows; however, he explained that neither he nor his wife could remember what the doctors said moments after their meetings.
Another got a three-ring notebook and filled it with documents about surgery chemotherapy, and radiation. His wife didn’t feel like looking, but she appreciated that he did.
4. New expectations.
After her treatment is finished, it’s important to remember that life likely won’t become “the same” right away, if at all. For several months, she’ll still feel exhausted from treatment, discomforts such as swelling of the surgical area if several lymph nodes were removed (lymphedema), post treatment check-ups, in some cases hormone therapy, and fear of recurrence, along with body disfigurement, both temporary like hair loss and permanent following surgery.
Moreover, any cancer, whether his or hers, affecting reproductive organs adds a whole host of issues about sexuality and relationships, for both people. Emotional support from loved ones is a strong predictor of coping in breast cancer patients.
During the last six months to a year, time depending on whether chemo was needed, her role definitions have become confused, too. She may refrain from asking for help, being used to being the caregiver. Or she may need encouragement and support to return to become independent again.
So offer, do not hover, and now is not the time to bring up every relationship issue you’ve had during the past ten years. Neither is now the time, if you’ve been a habitually inattentive husband, to shower with gifts. A hug is better. And Silver suggests you can’t go wrong with flowers.
Meanwhile, there are some excellent opportunities on the web for breast cancer husbands or partners to find support at websites set up to help breast cancer husbands.
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