From the first moment my wife discovered
she had breast cancer, there was a deafening silence from the men I know. Even
ones whose wives, mothers or girlfriends had breast cancer seemed to have
received a gag order from some Central Cancer Command and did little more than
mumble about the experience. Not one to shut up for any known reason, I started
this blog…That was four years ago – as time passed, people searching for
answers stumbled across my blog and checked out what I had to say. The
following entry appeared in November of 2011…
It’s been my
experience that men don’t usually care that much about their hair. It’s also
been my experience that hair is VERY important to women.
That’s why the
most obvious result of chemotherapy – alopecia – has such a profound impact on
women and the men who love them. Women who lose their hair are OBVIOUS to
everyone who looks at them. They are noticed; they stand out in public in a way
a bald man will never stand out. We admire it even – Kojack, The King of Siam,
Captain Jean-Luc Picard are all heroes and we don’t even notice their shiny
heads. But bald cops, Queens and starship Captains would be so odd that most of
us wouldn’t even remember the rest of the record, reign or voyage.
As men with
wives, girlfriends and mothers who will or who have lost their hair because of
breast cancer, we stand in an unusual place.
We have to be
honest encouragers.
“Honey, how does
this wig look on me?”
“Is the scarf
the right color for my skin?”
“If I wear a
baseball cap every day, will you still think I’m sexy?”
“If I don’t wear
anything on my head in public, will you be embarrassed?”
The first
response to each question is initially: “It looks fine, dear”, “It looks fine,
dear”, “Of course I will”, “Nothing you could wear or not wear would embarrass
me”.
The problem with
the response is that our loved ones are our loved ones and a diagnosis of
“stupid” does NOT go hand-in-hand with a diagnosis of breast cancer. They know
when we are patronizing. I learned the hard way not to patronize my wife. When
she asked one of the questions above, I had to take my time and think. I had to
consider my answer not because I wanted to be right, but in order to battle the
deep-seated desire to avoid inflicting any more pain on a person worn out from
the constant fight against cancer.
So I studied her
as she modeled the wig, scarf, hat or bald pate.
Honestly
responding, I gave my opinion. When it was honest, it gave her FEEDBACK and
while the ultimate choice was still hers, she most likely felt that my response
– especially before her hair started to grow back – was honest and another data
point in her effort to decide what to wear that day.
Ultimately, I
could do nothing more important that to be consciously HONEST!
