Hurry up and Wait!

One thing is for sure, you need to be patient being a cancer patient. A great deal of time is spent waiting. Waiting for appointments, waiting for results, waiting for doctors and waiting for next steps. Being a 'get it done kind of guy', this is very difficult for me. Sitting in many different waiting rooms over the past few weeks, you can see others also patiently waiting. As I sit there I think to myself- Why are they here? Are they a patient or a caring support person? What type & stage of cancer do they have? What was their life like prior to their cancer diagnosis? What would they be doing if they didn't have to be here?

Most of us sit in silence waiting for our name to be called. There is an eerie silence. I find it difficult to strike up a conversation with others who are also waiting. What would I say? Will I offend someone? I'm not even sure that I would want to talk about my own journey out loud with others. As I look around the waiting room I get the sense of melancholy. It is as if all of us sitting here are frozen in time. Our lives have suddenly been put on hold and we focus on our individual cancer journey. And we wait!

Don't get me wrong the medical professionals are trying their best to keep on schedule and reduce the amount of time that we have to wait. I can imagine how difficult is must be for doctors, nurses and other health care professionals to meet with families, share results and updates. You can't rush this. Each family deserves the time they need to ask questions and understand what is happening every step of the way.

Waiting for news and outcomes is the hardest of all. Tests results take time and sometimes the time between the test and the sharing of results can seem like forever. Too often lately my results has not been positive. Despite this, we try to remain positive.

As a cancer patient or a family member of a cancer patient, we need to be patient. In most cases it is hurry up and then wait.

Richard