The Big C

 When someone is diagnosed with cancer, lead with help not curiosity

 

No sooner had Buckingham Palace announced that King Charles had been diagnosed with a form of cancer than the speculation started. What kind of cancer was it? At what stage had it been discovered? What was the first line of treatment? Was it chemotherapy or radiation? Would he need surgery? Was he going to try some alternative therapies? What was the prognosis? How was he feeling? How was Queen Camilla coping?

 

The questions came fast and hard, even though no answers were forthcoming. But then, that’s how it is for lesser mortals as well. Anyone who announces a cancer diagnosis can expect to be inundated with these questions, in varying tones of curiosity and concern (which is, perhaps, why some people choose not to disclose their condition at all). Not only are questions like these intrusive and unhelpful, they also put an unnecessary strain on a patient who may be clinging on to his or her medical privacy because it is the last thing he or she has control over.

 

Sometimes these questions come from a place of love, but too often they are just a form of prying. And on occasion, they are also asked with a view to getting reassurance. Oh he had lung cancer, did he? Pity he smoked a million cigarettes! (I don’t, so I’m okay.) Both her mother and sister got breast cancer as well? Ah, it must run in the family. (Not in mine, thankfully!). And so on.

 

If you ever feel tempted to ask such questions, I have just two words of advice for you: please don’t. Nobody will think you unfeeling and unsympathetic if you don’t probe deeper into anyone’s medical diagnosis. They will give you as much information as they are comfortable with – and you must be content with that.

 

What you can do, if someone shares their cancer diagnosis, is to make yourself helpful. And no, it is not helpful to mutter cliches like, “If there is anything I can do, please do let me know.” They will know you don’t mean it; and no, they will never let you know. 

 

Instead, do something off your own bat that will make their life easier. Make a batch of meals they can bung into a freezer and heat up for the rest of the week. If you know their reading tastes, buy books that you think would appeal to them, something that can occupy them during sleepless nights. Offer to drive them to their chemotherapy sessions and keep them company while they are there. Take the children off their hands for a couple of days a week and allow them the space to heal. Listen with a sympathetic ear if they want to vent. 

 

And here’s what you don’t do. Don’t suggest some quack remedies that worked such wonders for your aunt. Don’t send them links of articles of experimental therapies at the cutting edge of science; they’ve already googled them. Don’t tell them that everything is going to be okay; you don’t know that. Don’t tell them the cancer stories of other people – even if it is one with a happy ending. Everyone’s cancer journey is different; respect that.   

 

Just be there for them in practical ways. That’s all you need to do; and it’s all they want.

 

The Big C

It’s a word most of us tiptoe around; and when we do deal with it, we usually get it wrong

You expect gurus to give gyaan on how to live our lives and perhaps, how to prepare for the afterlife. What you don’t expect them to do is to hold forth on medical science and tell us how to remain disease free. So, you can imagine the consternation when the ‘Yogi, Mystic and Visionary’ (that’s his Twitter bio; I kid you not) who goes by the name of Sadhguru tweeted this to mark World Cancer Day: “#Cancer is no disease but unknowingly touching the Self-Destruct button. Needs deeper exploration…”

Needless to say, accusations of insensitivity and ignorance flew around and among the most offended were people who had survived cancer and could not believe they were being told that their ill-health was because they had ‘unknowingly touched the Self-Destruct button’.

Intrigued by this throwaway remark, I went on to the venerable Sadhguru’s website to read more about his theories on cancer. And among the reams of prose about the ‘energy body’ the ‘food body’ and the ‘mental body’, I found this little gem about breast cancer: “Today, some women do not conceive at all, or for most women, childbearing is over before they are 30 years of age…the necessary hormones and enzymes are still being produced but are not made use of…that part of the body becomes low energy, which attracts cancerous cells and becomes a place for them to accumulate.”

So, there you are, ladies. You better push a couple out before the Big C gets you.

I’m kidding, of course. But the worrying thing is that many people are probably taking this as gospel truth. And God alone knows how many women are now berating themselves for getting breast cancer because they didn’t take their reproductive duties seriously.

But while this is sad and troubling enough, what is even worse is that it is not just ‘visionaries’ like Sadhguru or the miracle-cure touting Ramdev who indulge in this kind of talk. The rest of us don’t cover ourselves in glory either, when it comes to speaking about cancer or dealing with those who suffer from it. It’s not that we are necessarily insensitive or even wish to give offense. It’s just that we tend to be a little tone-deaf when it comes to this subject.

Let’s just take one phrase: ‘cancer survivor’. We use that to describe those who have overcome the disease. But what does that make those who haven’t? Are they ‘cancer victims’?  

And then, there’s our propensity to say stuff like “She battled bravely against cancer and beat it.” Which sounds very upbeat and lovely but what is the sub-text here? That those who ‘lost’ to cancer did not ‘fight’ hard enough? That it is their fault that they are dead? Clearly not. But it does seem like we are blaming them for not being good enough to beat the Big C.

So, how does one negotiate the minefield that surrounds the disease? Well, here’s a list of some do’s and don’ts.

·     *  Don’t bombard patients with clichés like “Stay positive” and “Stay Strong”. The last thing someone coping with chemotherapy and intimations of mortality needs is some gormless creature chirping: ‘Always look on the bright side of life’. Or even blithering on about how important it is to ‘fight hard’ against the disease. It’s not just annoying, it’s offensive. Especially because it puts the onus of recovery on the patient. Not getting any better? That’s because you’re not fighting hard enough. Cancer not responding to treatment? You really need to work on that positive attitude. Surely, you can see how infuriating this kind of stuff can get?

·     *  Don’t come armed with anecdotes about other people who had cancer and how they coped with the disease when you visit. It’s really not helpful to know that your aunt was diagnosed with the very same disease and how she found this wonderful doctor who cured her. It is even less helpful to be told about your neighbour’s mother who was diagnosed too late for help (“the tumour was just too big and too awkwardly positioned for surgery”) and passed away peacefully at home. We all have stories about people in our lives who suffered from this dreaded disease. But we must learn to keep them to ourselves and focus on the unique experience of the person sitting before us.

·     *  And whatever you do, please don’t talk about miracle cures. Don’t suggest a pilgrimage to some saint’s shrine. Don’t offer magic water from some scared lake. Just don’t. It amounts to insulting people’s intelligence or giving them false hope. And it does no good.

·    *   Do try and offer practical help. If there are young children in the house, offer to take them off for a special treat so that the mother/father can have some time off. Set up a team of volunteers, who can help with cooking dinner and lunch on a relay basis. Accompany the patient to hospital when he/she goes for chemotherapy and distract them with idle chat – or even just sit in companionable silence.

·     *  Do try and remember that this is your friend/family member/loved one, a person with an identity that goes beyond their cancer status. Ask about their health if you must but don’t dwell upon it. Nobody wants to feel as if the only interesting thing about them is the disease they are suffering from. They’d much rather you treated them just like you did before. So laugh, joke, argue, and yes, fight. Because that’s the only way you can make them feel like their normal selves. And they’d give anything to feel like that for even one fleeting moment.

Domestic Goddess in a domestic…

Yes, we all feel for Nigella Lawson; but it’s time to back off and let her live her own life

Domestic Goddess. That was always how we were meant to see Nigella Lawson. Hell, she even put that helpfully in the title of her second book, How To Be A Domestic Goddess, for those of us who were too thick to get it.

And Domestic Goddess she certainly was. The voluptuous Earth Mother, cleavage quivering like the creamiest blancmange, as she bent over the stove to create one stunning treat after another. She smiled beatifically at the camera, dipped her fingers into chocolate sauce and licked them clean, rustled up amazing three-course meals for her friends in a fairy-lights bedecked living room, while her two young children, Cosima and Bruno, ran around looking absolutely adorable in the background.

Who could possibly resist? Not me. I loved her (and still do) from the moment she first hoved into view in her first TV series, Nigella Bites, cooking in her home kitchen in her London flat and making it all look so easy. By the time the second season was being filmed, though, the idyllic home life portrayed on camera was an elaborate fiction. While Nigella fried and roasted and baked and the kids romped about, her first husband, John Diamond was in the bedroom, battling the throat cancer that first took his tongue and then his life. But you could have never guessed the trauma that Nigella was going through behind the brilliance of that on-camera smile.

In that sense, Nigella was less TV cook and more accomplished fiction writer. Like the best novelists of our times, she created a perfect, rose-tinted world in which it was forever summer and drew us in with its promise of sunshine and double chocolate cake until we wanted nothing more than to be a part of it. As we watched Nigella go shopping for organic meat and vegetables, throw together a superb dinner (easy-peasy, she assured us), pour herself into a cocktail dress and greet her guests with a glass of champagne in hand, we knew that this was the life – and we wanted a part of it, if only as gawping viewers.

But the fiction served a greater purpose than mere TV ratings. The persona of the Domestic Goddess proved to be the perfect cover to hide behind as Nigella endured a third bereavement (she had already lost her mother and her sister to cancer). The second season of Nigella Bites premiered a week or so after her husband’s funeral, and watching those shows now, I can’t help but wonder if Nigella was conjuring up those images of domestic bliss on television in the hope that life may soon imitate art.

If she was, then it worked brilliantly. She found love again with art collector and former adman Charles Saatchi, and the two of them moved in together and then married to play blended families with her two kids and his only daughter, Phoebe. They have been married ten years and in this phase of her life, Nigella has gone from strength to strength (her net worth is now said to be in the range of 20 million pounds). Since her first cookbook How To Eat (the title was suggested by John Diamond) became a best-seller, she has produced nine more books, presented several TV series (Nigella Feasts, Nigella Express, Nigella Kitchen, Nigellissima) and is now going on to conquer America with a new food show, The Taste, in which she is a judge.

But if Nigella was just Superwoman – which she manifestly is – then we would just admire her; and maybe just resent her a teeny tiny bit. The reason we love her is because she is also Everywoman. She has seen loss, suffered through tragedy, wrestled with every challenge life has thrown her and emerged triumphant in the end, gorgeous smile intact.

That is the woman that all of us knew and loved. And when that picture-perfect persona was shattered before our very eyes with the publication of those pictures of Charles Saatchi’s hands around the throat of our heroine, we felt a very personal sense of betrayal. Shock was followed by outrage, and then with reams of unsolicited advice for Nigella. Get the hell out of your marriage. Dump that bully of a husband. He doesn’t deserve you. Stand up for yourself. Be a role model for other women. Don’t take this nonsense.

Yes, I know that all of us feel for Nigella Lawson right now. But let’s not forget that nobody knows how to live her life better than Nigella herself. Even if the Domestic Goddess has been turned into a Poster Girl for Domestic Violence with those photos, that is not the image that will come to define her.

If the past has taught us anything it is that Nigella Lawson is The Great Survivor. Today she may be wandering wanly around the streets of London, pale-faced and hollow-eyed, as low-life packs of paparazzi hound her every move, and the tabloids put her on Divorce Watch (her wedding ring is off! It is still off!!). But before we know it, she will be back, having re-invented herself for another stint in the sun. We just need to give her time and space to make sense of this phase of her life – and move into the next.