Great Stuff: How to best treat a patient? With “Cancer Etiquette”
Published: June 26, 2005
While talking to a close friend on the phone, Rosanne Kalick revealed she would need a double mastectomy because of breast cancer.
“Well, at least you’ll be symmetrical,” the friend said, trying to make light of the situation.
Kalick was taken aback. It was her second time going through cancer treatment — she already had endured multiple myeloma, a blood cancer, several years prior to developing breast cancer — and she thought her friends would have learned by now. She was wrong.
“I thought, maybe something is going on here,” says Kalick, of White Plains, N.Y. “Cancer etiquette: That phrase flashed through my mind.”
She reached out to other cancer survivors and discovered that they, too, had endured insensitive comments and awkward gestures. But she couldn’t find much published information on the topic.
Having been a librarian for many years, she decided to write a book. “Cancer Etiquette: What to Say, What to Do When Someone You Know or Love Has Cancer” (Bookmasters, $19.95), a four-year effort, was published in May.
It is packed with stories from survivors and practical communication strategies for friends and family, including when to make a joke, when to use religious comments or when to simply say nothing at all.
Kalick also delves into appropriate humor, gifts and other methods to comfort, along with explaining the surprising physical and mental changes cancer can bring.
“A bottle of moisturizer, for example, is not only good for a woman’s skin, often dry from chemotherapy, it serves as a reminder that she is still a woman,” Kalick writes in the book.
Some of her advice is based on experience, but she says she talked to about 1,000 people for the book, using the Internet and databases to find sources.
Kalick explains that just a few decades ago, a diagnosis of cancer was a death sentence, and talking about cancer was taboo.
Even now, with survivors living longer and new treatments always on the horizon, some of the old fears still surface, particularly in the way people react to the news that a friend or loved one has cancer.
Much of “Cancer Etiquette” revolves around the level of intimacy between the person diagnosed with cancer and the person trying to comfort him or her.
A co-worker, for example, might not appreciate a joke about the extended vacation he’ll have during chemotherapy. But a spouse might.
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Cancer Etiquette: What to Say, What to Do When Someone You Know or Love Has Cancer“If you did not speak about an individual’s sex life, breast size or baldness before the diagnosis, what makes you think it is appropriate to ask those questions now?” Kalick writes.
The occasional gaffe is going to happen, even when the person’s intentions are innocent, Kalick says. Cancer is a complex, frightening disease.
In the long run, it’s not the gaffes that matter; it’s the connection between people. Seldom does someone want to endure cancer alone.
“There are no magic words,” Kalick writes. “The magic is that friends and family are generally there for us.”
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