But what happens when we are jolted by the diagnosis of a possibly fatal chronic illness such as cancer? After recoiling from the shocking news and accepting its reality, how can we cope with this new state of uncertainty? How can we adjust our lifelong attitudes and renew our trust in life? For the first time, we find ourselves in the strange and disruptive situation of having to cope with living and dying at the same time. How can we do it?
The threat of serious illness unleashes a wide range of moods and emotions. We swing back and forth between fear and hope, nostalgia and yearning, sadness and joy, self-affirmation and self-doubt, confidence that modern medicine offers the prospect of fighting the disease and concern that treatments can fail. Religious people sense God's closeness at times and at other times feel abandoned.
Searching for Answers To avoid confusion and despair, these and other contradictory feelings have to be sorted out, faced squarely and dealt with.
New social and economic questions also arise. Should you keep trying to fulfill your ambitions, to build and compete? Will telling your friends and co-workers that you have cancer adversely affect your prospects for success? How should you protect your family from financial disaster? How do you emerge from the loneliness that seems to accompany illness and find meaning within your silent universe?
Denial of your illness lessens your capacity to find answers to these and other vital questions. But if you retain control of the illness as much as possible, you will be able to look directly at your own mortality and deal with it.
