Has something happened to Amy?

[conuly]

Two letters, one column:

Dear Amy: I’m currently undergoing treatment for breast cancer. People have had some very odd reactions to the baldness caused by my chemotherapy.

I’m not asking for advice on how to handle it, but I am seeking an explanation.

I find it very strange that several friends have asked to see me bald.

Those who see me in person ask me to take off my hat.

Others (who are not in person) ask me to send them a picture.

My very quick response to them is, “Absolutely not!”

They react with stunned confusion: “Why not?”

Amy, do I really need to explain that?

I tell them I have a difficult time looking at myself at the moment; I don’t want them with that image or actual photo.

I don’t think anyone losing hair to chemo should ever be ashamed of how it looks. I have no issues at all with those that chose to show it. I admire them. But the fact is, everyone handles it differently.

I am very private. I don’t want any public disclosures about my illness and treatment.

The thing that surprises me most is that the request comes from my closest friends who know how private I am.

I’m hoping you can shed some light on this odd human behavior.

— Confused

Dear Confused: I agree with how you are handling these reactions and requests.

You might find out more by asking people why they are interested in seeing your bald head. They might admit to being curious – but I genuinely believe that there is more to it.

We’ve all seen magazine articles or depictions on movies or TV where women reveal their dramatic chemo-related hair loss.

This is always seen as a heartbreaking but ultimately triumphant moment where a woman vows to “beat this thing,” and her friends rally around her. Some friends and family members will even shave their own heads in solidarity.

My instinct is that on a deep level people are trying to basically force you into what they believe will be a dramatic “reveal,” – in order to respond by comforting you. Their intentions are to reassure you that you look great, or tell you that your hair will grow back quickly, or that it will grow back curly (the way their sister-in-law’s did).

In doing so, they will make themselves feel better about what you are going through – and they will make your cancer treatment just a little bit about them.

My theory is that this is the moment your friends are trying to provoke. They are willing to make you uncomfortable in order to try to comfort you.

You have the right – and the responsibility – to handle this phase of your treatment however you want to. That includes refusing to be shoehorned into somebody else’s storyline.

Dear Amy: My husband of 55 years Googled two female television personalities. He said he was curious about their age.

Pressing him further, he admitted that he did so because they were pretty.

I felt hurt, ugly (which I am not), and most of all cheated on!

He doesn’t think he did anything wrong.

Can you understand how I feel, or am I totally overreacting?

— Upset!

Dear Upset! Although I don’t want to diminish your feelings about this, I think you should work very hard not to feel that way.

I agree with your husband about this.

Have you ever Googled Daniel Craig? Or Pierce Brosnan? Or Richard Gere?

If not, I suggest that you do so, immediately.

Looking someone up on the internet because they are attractive is why the internet was invented in the first place.

Your husband is not cheating, any more than he would be if he was leafing through an issue of Parade Magazine and decided to peruse a feature about Jane Pauley.

I hope you will NOT take this to heart. Your husband would be wise to affirm his affection and devotion to you.

https://www.arcamax.com/healthandspirit/lifeadvice/askamy/s-2473439?fs

Comments

[conuly]

Look at that! Perfectly acceptable advice, no need for me to throw my computer across the room.

My entire world is being shaken right now.

[ashbet]

Has to be ghostwritten!! The first one, especially!!

[dine]

the advice is both good & on target, so I'm guessing someone's filling in cuz she's on vacation?

[conuly]

I hope it's that and nothing dire, I'd feel guilty about all this if something had happened.

[conuly]

BTW - everybody talks about the missing hair, but nobody mentions the equally missing fingernails and lemme tell you, that's the bigger problem. Nobody is ripping out their nails in solidarity, and I don't blame them!

[wordweaverlynn]

Missing fingernails? I hadn't known.

[conuly]

Yup, the chemotherapy targets fast-growing cells. Our nails and hair, which are both made of the same stuff anyway, are fast-growing.

[quodthey]

i didn't know about the fingernails but one thing my sister said was that nobody ever mentions that it can also change how food tastes, which was a terrible discovery for her.

[heavenscalyx]

Yeah, someone I know is having issues with both taste and texture (as in certain textures are painful) though it’s hard to tell if the latter is chemo or post-surgical (brain cancer).

[ekaterinn]

My mom was never on chemo, but she did have brain surgery and issues with taste for about a year after that. Chocolate tasted terrible to her, as did most sweets.

[jadelennox]

On the other hand, my dad was shocked that it put his Crohn's into remission (which I guess is a thing doctors all know -- chemo would be a great treatment for all auto-immune diseases, if only it weren't, you know, chemo), so for him, the last years of his life he was able to eat for pleasure for the first time in a decade.

(Not diminishing how shitty this was for your sister, mostly just piling on how hella weird chemo is.)

[laurajv]

you know....I know enough people living with Crohn's and in misery with it that I have to wonder if anyone's trialed short courses of chemo for it. I mean. Not that chemo is fun at ALL but I do know people who'd put up with it for remission.

[jadelennox]

Huh, good question. I poked around a bit and saw some bloggy type articles, and so I looked on pubmed and got stymied because I guess "chemotherapy" is just a non-scientific collective term meaning "the use of a variety of drugs for cancer which are known to be cytotoxic, which appears to mean "toxic to cells." Medicine is so weird.

Anyway I played around with MeSH headings for a while and didn't find much, though I might have been searching the wrong terms. I did find one meta-analysis: Bakouny Z, Yared F, El Rassy E, Jabbour R, Hallit R, Khoury N, Honein K, Bou Jaoude J. Comparative Efficacy of Anti-TNF Therapies For The Prevention of Postoperative Recurrence of Crohn's Disease: A Systematic Review and Network Meta-Analysis of Prospective Trials. J Clin Gastroenterol. 2019 Jul;53(6):409-417. doi: 10.1097/MCG.0000000000001006. PMID: 29517709. And that work only identified nine prior studies! So there's a lot more work to be done, here. But in any case there has been some research identifying good drugs. I didn't look to see how well the drugs were tolerated, though.

[jadelennox]

"They are willing to make you uncomfortable in order to try to comfort you.

You have the right – and the responsibility – to handle this phase of your treatment however you want to. That includes refusing to be shoehorned into somebody else’s storyline."

This is a really great, succinct definition of the problem.

[azurelunatic]

... googling a celebrity.
Is basically the most harmless thing that exists.

Is the LW extremely out of touch?
Extremely insecure?
Excessively nosy into her husband's private activities?
Traumatized from something?

It might be worth unpacking with a therapist, because that's such an extreme reaction to something very small, and without more information it's very hard to understand.

[azurelunatic]

Also, "pressing him further" sounds like what my partner's abusive ex used to do.

[laurajv]

also, I wonder how she found out he Googled celebrities? is she in the habit of checking his search history? if so, why?

[azurelunatic]

My partner's charming ex once confronted them to see what they were spending their time on because they had some unwatched shows in the DVR.