Thursday, June 19, 2014

A Post For All Who Want To Help - Super Important!

It's been a while since I've posted yet again. Let's call it lack of inspiration. 

Inspiration hit me recently when speaking to a friend. This friend was genuinely offering me support and wanted to do something for me to make my cancery life easier. This is something a lot of you ask me often. "What can I do for you? Is there anything I can do to help?"

I decided to be honest with this friend, and I have decided to be honest with all of you. While I truly appreciate these offers of food, asking to help me with housework, sharing some fancy new cure you heard about, and everything else you wonderful people offer, I have to admit they actually become a little bit frustrating. Again, I know these gestures are sincere and come from a good place. But my cancer is life long. I may live 10 years, I may live 50, hell I may even live 1. No matter how long I'm around, I would like to spend whatever time I have left living as normally as possible. I mean, do you plan on still asking me how I am feeling in 4 years? Can you imagine if everyone you knew asked you every single day a question that basically reminded you that you were dying? It sucks. If my cancer was temporary and  I had some hope of beating it, than it would be quite different. Unfortunately for me I am aware that my tumours will never go away. This isn't me having a bad attitude, this is just fact. It's hard to accept but we all have to. 

So what can you do for me? It's quite simple really. All I ask is that you treat me as normally as possible. Exactly how you treated me pre cancer. This means never uttering the phrase, "how are you feeling?" to me. For my own mental health I have decided to stop responding to all texts that say this unless I have not told you previously not to ask. If I have not told you then I will politely respond to you by asking you not to ask me this anymore. However, if you know not to ask then in my opinion you are not respecting me or my wishes and you do not deserve a reply. Instead, why not ask me normal people things like, "hey Kayla, how's things? How's your non existent love life? How's your new puppy"? These kinds of questions would be awesome. I don't want to hear questions about my tumours, my treatments, or what's happening in my cancery world. If I want to talk about these things, let ME bring them up. Please. Just allow me that. 

So. There you have it. This is all I ask. I don't think it's asking a lot. I really hope a lot of you read this particular post and I intend to over post it to get the word out to as many of you as possible. It's my hope that this will drastically improve my stress levels and my quality of life within my social relationships. I want to thank all of you in advance for respecting my request and understanding my position.

You're all rock stars...just not as big a rock star as me 😉

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