Since I had been diagnosed with amelanotic nodular melanoma in early December 2014, I’ve actually been pretty cautious about who I tell. Blog nonwithstanding, I haven’t gone public on social media asking for prayers and positive thoughts. Part of me loathes those messages because unless you are actually a close friend, you’ll half-heartedly post “Praying for you” and then go on with your day. And it seems like a conversation I should be having in person with people. I think it’s better for them to see me looking relatively healthy (aside from that excision wound – but I’d probably have that covered up for most of the discussion). Cancer is such a weird word for people and the mental image that they may get is far different than my current reality.
This past week, my husband and I hosted two different couples for dinner. Because I’m still limping around and it’s been really cold, we figured it would be better to give people a reason to come to us than trying to make me walk around in the cold or in a busy restaurant.
The first couple are friends we’ve known since we moved into our building. They were aware of my diagnosis prior to the excision because, after more than a few glasses of wine, I let it slip that I was having a procedure done on my leg. That led to questions which eventually led to me giving the whole backstory. The other couple are friends that we hadn’t seen in probably six months, but always have fun when we get together. Obviously, they were not aware of my situation.
So, the first couple came over and we spent lots of time laughing and joking about things as we finished one, then two bottles of wine. We were in the third bottle and I was in the middle of the humorous story about pouring vinegar on my leg when she said something along the lines of “suck it up”. Because I know her fairly well, I just assumed that she was trying to be funny and act as if I was normal (i.e. not cancerous). But her husband reacted quite differently, actually getting mad at her for being cavalier about the situation. She even sent me an email the next morning apologizing for “making light” of my situation. I was really taken aback – one, because I didn’t think she had anything to apologize for; and two, because I never thought that I was putting myself in the “poor me” category when I talk about this. I never say to people “I’m going to die from skin cancer and please all stand around my bedside until it finally takes me”. I think I’m fairly realistic telling people, “I don’t really know if it’ll come back. The type I have is pretty aggressive and the recurrence rate is pretty high…but I could die from liver failure before that happens too, so let’s have another glass of wine.”
The other couple met the hubby in an adjacent bar before he brought them up to the condo. I was still rushing around (limping around quickly) trying to get ready. When we all finally got together, I knew right away that my husband spilled the news to them already. She was so solicitous, asking how I was doing, almost cautiously, like I would break. I realized that being outed like that, rather than me telling people personally, created a reaction that was almost night and day. So, I joked around, acted just like my normal self, and soon enough, they realized that while I may have had cancer, I was also still Nicole – sarcastic, silly, irreverent Nicole, who is now adding cancer jokes to the repertoire.
The reactions of my two friends is making me wonder. How better is it to hear my news? Do I tell them in person and almost spring it on them? Do I have someone else tell them first and let them be prepared to talk about it if I do? How would I prefer to hear this type of news if it was one of my good (but maybe not best) friends? Is it better to go public or be outed first? I don’t really know the answer to that.