When the news comes in your house that your spouse, sibling, parent or anyone you love the most in your life has cancer it brings you also to an emotional trauma.
No one ever likes to hear the 6-letter word cancer. Upon hearing those words is like tearing anyone’s heart apart and even you too who do not have cancer feel many different feelings the same with someone who has one.
As like what I mentioned to my recent article, the moment that you feel an emotion; whether being happy or sad and angry (especially when hearing someone has cancer), you must pay attention to the feelings you are experiencing.
Whether you saw it or didn’t, the feeling is always the same: you are devasted with the news and you must keep being mindful.
Being mindful during these circumstances are a very important part of the cancer journey of your loved one. It will help yourself to support him/her with cancer better. You have to be ready emotionally when supporting someone with cancer and never ignore your feelings to focus on the needs of your loved one.
Never block your feelings and always remember not to forget yourself despite you see the person with cancer suffers every second of the day.
Your pain is normal. Feel it. You may ask yourself why things like this need to happen. Before you will be ready to accept the bad news, embrace the pang feeling of this terrible message, let it consume your entire soul, recognize it don’t deny, and welcome it with open arms before you can move on and start living a life with full of battles with cancer.
No one is not vulnerable from bad news such as hearing someone is having cancer.
So, whenever you know someone who’s having a traumatic experience in life such as cancer, that affects you, too. And immediately, you must know how to process the information, deal with it and move on while facing cancer together with someone who is diagnosed.
We all respond to tension and trauma differently, but do you know that there are steps that can be done to address the challenge ahead? We want to deal with it, adopt coping mechanisms, and make the situation less traumatic:
- Accept the negative emotion.
If you are able to accept negative emotions without trying to change them are better equipped to deal with stress. - Repeat exposure to the news.
Repeat exposure to a negative event could neutralize its effects on your thoughts and moods. - Reframe your thoughts.
If you look away from the negative emotions and think about the context of the situation, your mind will be taken away from the unwanted emotions that are linked with that memory. - Learn to overcome adversity.
Acquiring resilience and overcoming adversity can be learned, and it involves working on your thoughts and behaviors, as well as actions. In doing so, being optimistic about having hope for the cure, ability to solve problems who inevitable or be aware of your emotions is some of the piece of pieces of advice in learning to overcome or getting over from emotional trauma cancer brings. - Be kind to yourself.
Look after yourself, do what you think is helpful to yourself. Sleep early, eat healthily and prioritize yourself once in a while.
By doing this, you are also making the cancer journey of someone with cancer less complicated.
Now you think you are ready facing cancer together with your loved one, you and the rest of the family are all challenged to find helpful ways of dealing with the disruptions and dangers caused by cancer and with the side effects of its medical treatments.
*The steps in dealing emotional pain in this post has been reworded and adapted from Medical News Today.
My name is Cielo, the author of “The Cancer Voice Asia”, a blog that aims to support and inspire anyone who is facing cancer. I know how it feels to be diagnosed with a rare and aggressive type of cancer, Leiomyosarcoma, at the age of 29. I know the challenges, the fears, the hopes, and the joys of living with cancer. I want to share my story with you and connect you with others who understand what you are going through. Together, we can empower ourselves and fight against the disease. Join me on this platform and let’s make our healing journey a meaningful one.
