Two magazines bought last week each with a cancer story. Clive James, author, critic, broadcaster, poet, was actually diagnosed with a form of leukemia in 2011 but has benefited from an experimental drug treatment. He was recently admitted to hospital so that a tumour in his salivary glad could be dealt with. The other story was of Colm Toibin, the novelist. This was news to me but last year he was diagnosed with testicular cancer which had spread to a lung and his liver. He goes into quite a bit of detail with regard to the discomfort he has suffered due to the disease and the very unpleasant side effects he has endured.
This kind of thing is not uncommon these days, people sharing their experiences of illness in print. The first to make a major impact in the UK was the journalist John Diamond. He was diagnosed with throat cancer in 1997 and wrote about his experiences in his weekly Sunday Times column. This eventually became a book entitled C: Because Cowards Get Cancer Too.
It’s only natural that men like James, Toibin and Diamond should write about their illnesses. They are writers and writers write. If they carry on bashing at the keys or scribbling on the paper then they feel more like themselves and as they go through debilitating and unpleasant treatment that can only be good. Christopher Hitchens, the writer and critic and another cancer sufferer, produced a 3,000 word book review in his final days despite severe pain and chronic fatigue. The impulse to create is strong.
The other aspect of this is the mutual support that can arise as a result of published experiences. Diamond received a number of letters from people who were facing similar issues and enabled him to feel less isolated. Others were grateful to see something like their own experiences in print. We are constantly told that cancer is a very individual experience. No two people are the same. But it was encouraging for many to read Diamond’s column and to know that someone else understood and was finding a way through.
It has been good for me to hear of other people’s experiences especially those who have endured the same treatment regimen and have come through to return to their normal work and family life. You hold this before you in the difficult days. But you always return to the mantra: no two people are the same. In the end, this is my personal experience and no one has ever felt this way about the illness and the treatment. I have a backstory, a set or relationships, a range of priorities, a particular personality which when they come together form a unique life. It’s the same with everyone. So when illness becomes a factor in this then the experience and the response are similarly unique. I can be inspired and encouraged by the stories of others but how far does this really take me? In the end it is I with the cancer.
The thing is I bring more to the cancer than just my backstory, relationships, priorities and personality. My faith is in a God who became a human being and therefore knew the limitations of the human body and human psychology. He experienced hunger and thirst; He felt His emotions rise with the joys of life and He mourned the suffering he observed; He experienced horrendous physical pain and even endured the loss of God. The writer to the Hebrews says: ‘ We do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathise with our weaknesses . . .’ (Hebrews 4: 15) The result of this is that we can approach Him in prayer with confidence knowing ‘that we might receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.’ (Hebrews 4: 16) A God who has embraced the suffering of the world but knows the need of each individual, what they require in any moment, to continue to be the faithful witnesses he has called them to be.
This is where the rubber of my life hits the road of God’s purpose. So much of the journey is as yet unknown but that faith is possible which can say:
‘Because He lives I can face tomorrow;
Because He lives all fear is gone;
Because I know He holds the future,
And life is worth the living
Just because He lives.’
