Cancer Ghosting and Identity

I had never heard of cancer ghosting and so I was somewhat appalled to learn that it’s prevalent enough to earn itself an actual name, and an article. The term means just what you might imagine it might; it describes how some people disappear when their friends or family come out with a cancer diagnosis.

The article goes on to hypothesize why people might do it. The obvious answer to me is that they’re not really friends if that’s how they react when someone is in trouble. But there are also family members who have had the same dismissive reaction to a sibling’s cancer diagnosis. It just seems so bizarre. Given how many stories I’ve read of friends and family rallying to the cause of someone with cancer — and how supportive my friends and family have been - how can the opposite also be true?

People act funny when they hear the cancer word. We’ve come a long way since the days of our grandparents when cancer wasn’t spoken about — it was simply the c word. But there’s still a stigma attached to cancer and so the natural reaction of some people is to run as far away from it as possible. That’s true about some cancer patients too. There are people with cancer who don’t talk at all about their cancer; and there are stories, and movie cliches, of people who never share the fact of their diagnosis with anyone - loved ones included. The standard plot line is that they don’t want to be showered with the pity they assume comes with a diagnosis. But I think there’s more to it than that. There’s a genuine fear of becoming the cancer guy or girl - of having cancer swallow up your identity. No one wants to be the person who is mentioned in passing at a holiday dinner, “Oh Michael, yeah, I heard he had cancer.”

Of course, cancer shares a place in who I am as much as any of the other roles that I occupy. It is not my identity, but it is a part of it.

Part of it. Not all of it. Having cancer doesn’t wipe out all the other things that I’ve done and become over my lifetime. I’m a son, a brother, a husband, a father. I’ve made friends; lost friends; made new friends. I’ve worked for more than 40 years in many different jobs doing many different things. I’ve traveled widely; lived in a dozen or more cities. Played sports. Ran marathons. So many, many things over six decades. But there’s a fear that all of that gets brushed off stage when cancer enters. And most cancer survivors would agree on this universal belief: I should be the one who determines how and when I let it take center stage, if at all.

When I was first diagnosed, I remember how exhausting it was - not the cancer itself, but the social encounters. At the time, our kids were young and so our social calendar was full with sports and school activities. Everyone I ran into post-diagnosis, the first words out of their mouth were a very (overly?) sympathetic “How are you feeling?” There was one friend who I saw regularly and every time I saw him for maybe a year, had the same exact reaction. It flustered me a bit (although not as much as the friend whose reaction was to ask my wife if I had life insurance).

People are funny when they confront a friend with cancer. They just don’t know what to say and so many simply retreat to cancer’s faded to the background, and some apparently retreat forever. There have been many cancer bloggers and others who have traveled the “what to say to someone with cancer” road. I won’t retread the same path other than to say that you just need to take your cues from them. If they want to talk about their cancer; you listen. If they don’t, you don’t have to talk about their cancer; you don’t have to share stories of your great uncle who died from the same cancer; or a crazy new cure you heard about online. You don’t have to reassure them that they have the good cancer - no such thing. You don’t have to ask them about their treatment or the side effects. No, you don’t have to do any of that.

In reality, it doesn’t really matter what you say. It matters what you do. For some people, there are lots of things you can do, particularly if your friend is in active treatment. But for me, the most important thing anyone can do is to remain present. And by all means, don’t ghost them.