October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month. The Actual Dance is about many different things. It is about breast cancer. It is also about love. It is also about relationships. It is also about spirituality and what life really is. It is about a lot of things.
In October in recognition of Breast Cancer Awareness I will post a daily blog with a reflection about breast cancer. The reflections will stem from something in the play. (All quoted lines are text from the play.)
Day 19: Where Else Could I Possibly Be? I decided without much thinking that I needed to be with Susan every step of the way. I was with her at each doctor appointment. I was with her in the pre-op bay of the hospital. I spent “three long days and nights” in her room in the hospital after her double mastectomy. I was at each subsequent chemo-therapy session and each radiation treatment. These were among the most difficult moments for me, sometimes because I needed to do things I could not imagine doing like emptying “these to plastic bulbs that hung off either side of her chest that were filled with a red liquid.” Other times because I needed to be strong as the news became darker. In the time since this experience I have come to value those moments, perhaps the most, because I think they were the most important and ultimately most intimate moments with Susan. In the show after a particularly difficult time in the hospital I say, “I don’t know where else I could possibly be.”
Stat of the Day: 65.7 million caregivers make up 29% of the U.S. adult population providing care to someone who is ill, disabled or aged according to the Family Caregiving Alliance.
Task of the Day: Find someone who is a caregiver and offer to give them a break for an evening or an afternoon.
Resource of the Day: The Family Caregiving Alliance National Center on Caregiving can point you to a vast network of support for Family Caregiving.
In October in recognition of Breast Cancer Awareness I will post a daily blog with a reflection about breast cancer. The reflections will stem from something in the play. (All quoted lines are text from the play.)
Day 19: Where Else Could I Possibly Be? I decided without much thinking that I needed to be with Susan every step of the way. I was with her at each doctor appointment. I was with her in the pre-op bay of the hospital. I spent “three long days and nights” in her room in the hospital after her double mastectomy. I was at each subsequent chemo-therapy session and each radiation treatment. These were among the most difficult moments for me, sometimes because I needed to do things I could not imagine doing like emptying “these to plastic bulbs that hung off either side of her chest that were filled with a red liquid.” Other times because I needed to be strong as the news became darker. In the time since this experience I have come to value those moments, perhaps the most, because I think they were the most important and ultimately most intimate moments with Susan. In the show after a particularly difficult time in the hospital I say, “I don’t know where else I could possibly be.”
Stat of the Day: 65.7 million caregivers make up 29% of the U.S. adult population providing care to someone who is ill, disabled or aged according to the Family Caregiving Alliance.
Task of the Day: Find someone who is a caregiver and offer to give them a break for an evening or an afternoon.
Resource of the Day: The Family Caregiving Alliance National Center on Caregiving can point you to a vast network of support for Family Caregiving.
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