Helen Brown - After Cleo

In the back of the fridge I checked out some stewed apples destined to fester. I examined them closely and reckoned they had only a day to go, even by my standards. I spooned the apples into tiny bowls, tossed in some dried fruit and sprinkled them with crumble topping. Delicious, they said that night, scraping the bowls so clean they hardly needed to go in the dishwasher. The fools.

A brochure encouraged me to spend the days leading up to surgery constructively, filling the freezer so the family would survive while I was in hospital and I wouldn’t have to start slaving the minute I returned (when my arms would be too weak to lift pots and plates).

No wonder women get cancer in their breasts, the great symbols of nurture. Heading home from the supermarket with three months’ worth of washing powder and toilet paper, my style behind the wheel was less aggressive than usual. Life, for all its imperfections, felt so very finite and precious. Immersed in thought, I missed a turn and found myself meandering through an unfamiliar neighbourhood.

Managing the reactions of others was sometimes harder than dealing with my own. The word ‘cancer’ had such an extraordinary effect I wondered if a name change couldn’t be considered. ‘Tulip’ perhaps (somebody kindly left a bunch on the doorstep). ‘I have Tulip and you needn’t worry.’ Because some friends reacted as though I’d told them they were dying. Once the news settled in, they arranged their faces in a slightly different expression that implied that they thought I was dying.

‘Is there anything I can do?’ has to be the most commonly heard question by anyone diagnosed with serious illness. It’s a safe ask, as the patient can be relied on not to say, ‘Well, yes, actually the upstairs loo is blocked and a wild animal’s scrabbling in our attic. Bring poison and a plunger.’

No, the air fills with a balloon of silence. The sufferer says, ‘Not just now thanks; you’re so kind. I’ll let you know.’ Irritated by the weakness of that response, I invented a new one: ‘Pray for me.’ I didn’t say it solely to make people feel awkward, as it sometimes clearly did. I was hardly in the gold medal department for praying myself, but I was open to the idea that prayers of the practised and sincere can pack a punch.

‘My life’s a mess, too,’ said an acquaintance, who by all accounts lived like a princess. ‘Our basement flooded and we’re having a hell of a time with the insurance company.’

‘You’ve just reminded me,’ said another. ‘I’m way overdue for a mammogram.’

Others were more upbeat, even though life wasn’t treating them kindly. Jodie the hairdresser had a tattoo for every failed love affair. There wasn’t much blank space left on her body. She planted a kiss on my cheek and wished me luck. She said, like me, her aunt had also had a vasectomy.

‘You not sick!’ shouted Sophie the wonderful cleaner who did her best to tidy our house up every two weeks. ‘My uncle is very important doctor in China for woman’s breast. He say stop drinking coffee. Drink more tea. And don’t think you are sick ! When you think sick you get sick. After you get out of hospital I find you good Chinese doctor. Help you get strong. He will make your face red again.’

The house was much tidier and smelt faintly of lemons after she left. I felt momentarily cheerful.

I decided not to respond to earnest messages asking after my health on the answer phone. There was an edge of relief in some of the voices. They didn’t want to go through the awkward business of talking to me. They felt safer leaving a recorded message . . . and so did I, just listening.

A few well-wishers deposited alternative therapy books on the doorstep. Having watched a dear friend die of breast cancer having refused all conventional treatment and dosing herself on mistletoe injections, I wasn’t tempted – or not just yet anyway. First I’d take whatever modern medicine had to offer. I did, however, start going to the old Chinese woman who did acupuncture around the corner.

My plot to escape the gym failed. Peter, my trainer, pointed out that I’d need strong arm and abdominal muscles to speed recovery. As an act of kindness, he started giving me lighter weights. He offered to visit the house twice-weekly when I felt strong enough after hospital. I said I’d think about it.

Sleep and more sleep. I couldn’t get enough. Shock, maybe. Katharine nestled beside me in bed some afternoons and read Kidnapped aloud. Once she’d wrapped her tongue around the wild old-fashioned language, Kidnapped was riveting. No wonder Samoans called Robert Louis Stevenson ‘ Tusi tala ’ – the Story-teller. He put Hollywood action writers to shame. It was a relief slipping away to a world of adventure and danger of a different kind.

‘All we need now is a cat,’ said Katharine one day, pausing between chapters.

I smiled back at her. Katharine sometimes has the ability to read my mind. A kitten curled up on the blanket would have completed the picture alright. An affectionate fur ball would calm my fears and be my constant companion through whatever lay ahead. A friend beside me even when the house was empty.

But the timing was all wrong for a new cat. I had enough on my plate.

The shrink had a tea bag string draped over a mug half filled with muddy fluid. It reminded her to drink, she explained. Otherwise she got migraines.

No wonder , I thought, listening to people moaning all day .

I was willing to keep an open mind about seeing a psychologist providing she didn’t use the word ‘journey’. Everything’s a journey these days, from climbing Everest in a wheelchair to having your underarms waxed. ‘Journey’ reduces everything to the tidy dimensions of a television script. If I’d wanted to be on a breast cancer journey, I’d have bought a ticket.

The shrink was mercifully down-to-earth and practical. She asked me to make a list of household tasks and stick it on the fridge for Philip and Katharine to work through. She suggested I write a list of friends who could be relied on to bring a meal to the house once a week while I was recovering. I couldn’t face the thought of troubling the busy, stressed-out people I was fond of. The last thing they needed was to be making soups and casseroles for me. Was I too proud, or simply a failure at friendship?

She offered tools to help me step back from negative emotions. For instance, instead of saying ‘I hate “The Girl from Ipanema”,’ I was supposed to say, ‘I’m having a thought that I hate “The Girl from Ipanema”.’ The idea was to encourage me to take a step back, instead of just reacting all the time, and accepting emotional reactions as reality. Likewise, instead of feeling angry at Lydia for taking off to Sri Lanka, I was to think, ‘I’m having angry thoughts about Lydia . . . etc.’ Though I wasn’t confident shoving a few extra words in was going to make much of a difference, there was no harm giving it a go. The technique was possibly a Westernised version of the Buddhist concept of detachment. According to Buddhist teaching, most human suffering springs from attachment. There’s some truth in that, but it’s the power of attachment that makes mother love so fierce. Without attachment, the human race would never survive.

The shrink also taught me a powerful new phrase: ‘My health comes first.’

My initial response was cautious. Favoured by hypochondriacs and neurotics since time immemorial, ‘My health comes first,’ gives you a licence to be annoying: ‘Yes I’d love to adopt your guinea pigs, but my health comes first.’

Nevertheless, the psychologist’s phrase did provide an excuse for something I felt like doing anyway – letting go of stuff that was too hard, or not relevant any more.