My Turn: After the breast cancer diagnosis, a need for reflection

A few months ago, I was diagnosed with early stage breast cancer. The diagnosis was unexpected and shocking because I had assumed that at my age — over 80 — I had passed that danger and mainly concentrated on coping with the usual aging health problems. Instead, I learned that older women are actually more vulnerable than younger ones to breast cancer.

After the diagnosis, I was immediately deluged with information and with people. There were pamphlets to read, charts and statistics to review, cassettes to listen to. There were consultations with physicians, oncologists, surgeons, therapists. There were conversations with breast cancer survivors and invitations from breast cancer support groups.

Certainly I knew that time was not to be wasted or options ignored in treating cancer. I knew that being busy and involved could be helpful distractions, and also that current medical practice suggested that a more informed patient could be a more satisfied patient.

But I also knew that patients were people, and different people react differently, so there could be no single “best” or “right” way in these circumstances.

For me, especially at first, everything felt like overload — too much, too soon, too fast.

The material I was given was always informative but sometimes more than I wanted or needed or was ready to know. The doctors were all professional and knowledgeable but somehow made me feel pressured to make prompt decisions and take prompt actions. The medical technology and equipment were all very impressive but also unfamiliar and overwhelming. The people I encountered were all well-intentioned, but even their acts of kindness sometimes seemed intrusive.

I realized that what I needed at that time was for the process to be slowed down, not speeded up; for the emotional level to be lowered, not raised; for there to be less input, not more and not all at once. I needed some space and time — at least, for a little while — to get over the initial shock and sense of threat, for personal reflection as well as reaction, for quiet introspection as well as copious information. This would not be a waiting time or wasting time but a special kind of working time — to face the fears and feelings, become accustomed to the new reality and find the strengths I had learned in the past and needed now for the future.

In other words, before I could be ready to cope with the new information and the new involvement, I needed an interval just by myself and for myself. I knew that there were decisions I would have to make and steps I would have to take, but I also knew that before I could begin this new medical journey with others, I first had to take some time out for my own inner journey with myself.

Hawthorne is a retired clinical social worker and emeritus faculty member of the School of Social Work at USC. She lives in Northridge.

My Turn is a forum for readers to recount an experience related to health or fitness. Submissions should be no more than 500 words. They are subject to editing and condensation and become the property of The Times. Please e-mail health@latimes.com. We read every essay but can’t respond to every writer.