My sister had to go back to the breast clinic this week, to investigate a suspicious lump.
Suddenly,
she was no longer just “my sister”. She was “my little sister”. I haven’t felt
like that about her for decades.
Oh, oh, oh, my little sister.
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| My sister (left) and I (1967) |
She only told me about the worrying lump
last week.
She had been hiding it from me (and from
everyone else).
I understand
this. When I went to my doctor with my newly-found lump, no-one knew except my
husband. I didn’t tell anyone that the doctor had referred me to the breast clinic.
I was completely convinced that it would turn out to be an innocent cyst, and
what was the point of sending people into unnecessary fits of fretting?
My sister
discovered her lump when I’d had my lumpectomy and was preparing for a
mastectomy. My state affairs sent her into self-checking mode, and she too
found a lump.
This was rather inconvenient. My mother was dying and needed endless
care. The organisational rigmarole that surrounds death took both my sisters
right out of their daily routine. At any other time, I would have come over to
Holland and pulled my weight, but now I couldn’t.
How on earth
could my sister fit a breast lump into all this?
She
postponed the trip to the doctor, waiting instead for the routine mammogram she
was due to have the day after our mother’s funeral.
(Which was,
incidentally, also the day my sisters had to clear out my mother’s rooms in the
nursing home. I, in the meantime, was back in London and comfortably settled in
bed, where I stayed for several weeks. That definitely sounds like the better
option.)
The routine
mammogram was, of course, not enough to establish whether or not her lump was
cancerous. My sister was having a lovely break in the English countryside with
her friend and the marvellous Helping Dog, but a string of messages from her doctor put a nasty stop to relaxing thoughts. She was summoned back to Holland, to
attend the breast clinic.
Suddenly, I saw how bad it must be for
others, watching someone you love go through the mill.
Yes, it is
tough for me to go through investigations, uncertainties, test results, bad news,
pain, horrible treatments. But at least I know how I am dealing with it.
When it is
my sister, all I can do is stand by and watch, helpless.
The thought of
my little sister having to go through surgery, radiotherapy, chemotherapy is
worse than the thought of having to go through it myself.
So I am writing this post out of respect
and appreciation for all my family and friends who are valiantly standing by,
watching me. Helpless, no doubt.
You haven’t
shared the extent of your own distress with me, and I am grateful for that,
because it really is too much for me to take on board other people’s feelings.
But if my worry about my sister is anything to go by, you may very well be sick
with worry about me.
The
question, therefore, should not only be: How
is Irene? but also: How is her
family? How are her friends?
How
is your sister? I hear you ask.
Here is some
good news, at long last: she is fine. Her breast lump turned out to be a cyst,
nothing to be concerned about, no treatment needed.
Just as well.
I was already having visions of the two of us united in baldness, which would
surely make our big sister feel left out. Furthermore, at the rate things
have been going in this family, people could begin to think that we are making
it up.
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