Am I a survivor?

 

Am I survivor?

survivor

səˈvʌɪvə/

noun

noun: survivor; plural noun: survivors

    A person who survives, especially a person remaining alive after an event in which others have died.

• the remainder of a group of people or things.

  
  

  "a survivor from last year's team"
• a person who copes well with difficulties in their life.

  
  

  "she is a born survivor"

  
  

  
  

  I received a mail from the Support Services of an excellent association of anglophones in Paris, asking me if I'd be happy to be put in contact with 'a breast cancer survivor'.  Of course, I was more than willing to be put in contact with someone who was looking for support in an area that I'd had experience.

  
  

  
  

  But I was shocked by the use of the word 'survivor' and I'm not sure why I had that reaction; it made me reflect on what the term meant to me and to others and whether it was appropriate and meaningful for my experience with breast cancer.  In fact, the person who was seeking support used that very term about herself. 
  

  So I did some research.
  
  Even finding an image for this post was revealing - type in 'survivor, image' into Google and you mostly get images of the TV show 'Survivor' with women in bikinis or mud baths, hunky guys with developed chests and determined expression on desert islands.  The image I settled on is one for suicide survivors in Canada.

  
  

  There's a very passionate discussion on the scn.cancer.org started by someone who considers she had 'an easy ride' and was uncomfortable with the term survivor.  I really identified with her.  However, many responders were slightly miffed by her use of the term 'easy ride' and considered themselves as survivors in the real sense that they were people who remained alive after an event in which others had died.  Many of them had gone through truly onerous, heavy and extensive treatments, relapses, several surgeries, chemo,  and to be honest, I think they had every reason to consider themselves survivors. 

  
  

  But for me and my case, I still don't feel it's an appropriate term.  Maybe I feel like I've had 'an easy ride' and in some ways, compared to others, I genuinely feel that I have, but I think that my main beef with the term 'survivor' implies that the situation that one has survived has finished.

  
  

  And let me tell you, it's NEVER finished!  I'm coming to the end of my Tamoxifen days - in January my hormone-therapy (Tamoxifen) will be finished as I will have been taking it for 5 years.  But the main thing that's never finished for me is that I cannot consider myself as 'done' with cancer.  At a risk of sounding like a downer (which is not my intention and doesn't reflect my state of mind at all), the worry about cancer coming back is always somewhere in the back of my mind.  There is always the possibility, unfortunately.  There are also the constant reminders - scars, changed body shape, side effects of the medication, pain in the scars, stabbling pains from the radiation go on for years (mine have anyway), fat necrosis in my right breast has left a large-ish palpable lump - which has gone down a little over the 4 years but causes anxiety for mammograms and ultrasounds.  I'll be in considerable pain if I forget and carry something heavy with my left arm, I am weakened and cannot do as much as before with my body.  And of course, there is the psychological effects and the memories of what I went through and what my friends and family also went through - they could also be classified as cancer survivors, I think, as their experience was not negligible.

  
  

  I think classifying myself as a 'survivor' is also presumptous - it will be an excellent feeling to get to the 5-year survival, which is a real milestone after this illness and I'll be considered as 'in remission' afterwards, but maybe I consider it's a superstition or tempting fate to call myself a survivor but in the same way, I am thankfully not living 'with cancer' but maybe I am 'post cancer', but I'm not convinced that's an appropriate term either.  Me,  I consider myself maybe in the 3rd definition of the term - 'someone who copes well with difficulties in her life'.  I think I do and I'm proud of that.

  
  

  Some of the alternative terms are fighters, winners, troopers, heroes, pink sisters, kindred spirits, breast cancer patient, muscle girl, iron woman but one post did resonate - "isn't the term survivor better than the alternative of 'cancer victim'.  Well, now you mention it, yes!  So maybe I am a survivor?

Anyway, here's an excuse to play two of my favourite versions of the song 'Survivor'.  Enjoy!


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lTYLf6uWZ6M

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mTERZZoEu9k