If a diagnosis of mesothelioma recently invaded your life or the life of someone you love, encouragement is what you have most need right now.
You heard the frightening statistics, frightening projections and negative predictions ?? ignite fear in your heart.
You need something to hang. Something that says it will be fine.
Hope is what you need.
Although I do not have cancer, I faced a life changing event when the doctor delivered the news that my newborn daughter would never function normally.
hope I needed to get through this time, and the many serious ones that followed.
Dealing with poorly chosen News
After the doctor delivered the news, I sobbed uncontrollably on my bed
one of my dearest friends sitting next to me, stroking my head.
"I just read a story about a family with a child with special needs, and they said they loved their child just the way he was and did not want him to another way, "she offered to try to encourage me.
He did not.
This baby grew inside me for nine months. I fully expect a girl or a boy in good health and has never amused I give birth to something other than that.
The emergency C-section and delivery of a child with a massive head injury has left me completely stunned.
Learning you or a loved one has a devastating cancer such as mesothelioma, almost always asks the same reaction. It is never easy to deal with overwhelming feelings of hopelessness.
The Balm of Optimism
The hospital discharged me one day after delivery. I went home, while my daughter, Elizabeth, struggled for life on a ventilator.
My husband, Phil, and I headed to the service of our church Wednesday night.
The small congregation swallowed us with hugs and tears. The pastor exchanged usual midweek format for a measure only to support and encourage us.
Person after person got up and told family stories or people they knew who were born with problems and who grew up to live a normal life.
Light seemed to invade the darkness that had covered my heart.
"Maybe it would not be as bad as the doctor said it would be," I thought to myself.
subsequently, the whole group prayed . aloud for us
My husband and I got out of there, the air I still remember the words of my sister as she came out with us. "She'll be fine," she said convincingly
Hope saturated our being
I look back now .. that optimism comes on steroids, and boy did we prepare and cocoon for difficult times come.
Elizabeth did get off the ventilator. Two weeks after the birth, I carried our baby home. This was the beginning of many years of ups and downs with a child who has never developed normally.
Words that Lift, not less
If mesothelioma has entered your life, you are living difficult times, too. It may be your spouse, your father or you diagnosed with this terrible cancer. You may feel quite negative and sad.
If it is a family member or friend, you're not sure what to say to offer encouragement. If this is you, you are thirsty for hope.
Some people in my life at the time of the birth of my daughter knew somehow what to say and do.
A friend sent a card each week with a Bible verse or inspirational words of a song. Others just offer a comment or two about someone they know who has overcome a similar situation, or a new medical treatment that they had heard of who could help.
Some simply have assured me that the doctors can not predict the exact results. They may be wrong.
"Well, that is true," I thought.
I compare these nuggets of inspiration for hope jumps on a river of despair and depression. I jumped from one to the other, and each kept me from sinking into sadness. They allowed me to move forward, not afraid of what the future would bring.
seek environments and people talking Encouragement
It is important to surround yourself with positive and others can share in your. experience
Here are some tips :.
- in your situation make an effort to reach people in your life that you know will instill confidence and positive thoughts
- Tell people what you need. Let them know that you are afraid and need words of encouragement to continue.
- Look for a group that can support you like your church, synagogue, a support group or a social club.
- Stay away from negative friends or relatives that let you feel down after their departure.
- Read uplifting material as Scripture or poetry or stories of hope.
- If your loved one has mesothelioma, then be the one to talk incessantly words of encouragement and faith in him. In truth, he will make the trip easier.
Nobody can predict the future
Mesothelioma researchers are working feverishly in many parts of the world to develop treatments for mesothelioma. Recently, a breakthrough in Australia showed the lungs of a human tumor almost clear after the gene therapy.
My experience has been that doctors often give the worst scenario. Keep this in mind when you listen to your doctor's words.
Be positive, hopeful and believe what people say when they offer bright, optimistic encouragement. Be transported through the day.
Offer yourself. Speak words of hope every day to your loved one with mesothelioma. Keep it above the darkness of the river.
It is okay if not everything you say turns out to be quite accurate. None of us can predict the future. Talk about what needs to be said in this time
Add Good to Bad.
When my daughter was still in neonatal intensive care, a pediatric neurologist evaluated what looked like seizures. After the release of Elizabeth, we visited the office several times a doctor for follow up.
The doctor delivered some news pretty hard for us during this time, but she had a way to soften gifted with messages of hope.
There will be times when difficult things can not be avoided.
what we can do for others in these situations is such a sunny alternative. Overcoming darkness to light with a positive comment, an optimistic prediction or a cheerful word to counter the difficult relationship.
I experienced it, and it really makes a difference.
I look back on those times when my ears were the words of welcome and remember the love and hope swaddling us like a blanket.
since then, my language was "hope". I pronounce the words of optimism when I meet someone on the phone, at the bedside or in the portion facing an illness or a situation that seems insurmountable.
I know that my only hope comment packs the power to raise them, if only for a little while. Then we hope that someone else will come with another springboard to carry over the current despondency.
On Looking Back
Regarding my daughter, it is true that every positive prediction or hopeful thinking developed in reality. Yet I still cherish each of them and the people who cared enough to vote.
They served their purpose.
They softened my journey to the final result.
And guess what? The doctor was not accurate in all its predictions.
He told Elizabeth would never walk, talk, eat or recognize me. Only one in four has come true.
She is confined to a wheelchair, but really we can not get it is still sometimes. She can feed if we put up with food, and we certainly know. She is loved by all who meet her.
And even today, its future is not over.
I do not know what medical advances could help in the future. There is a glimmer of hope that medical advances bring its development gains in the coming years.
Like I'm not sure if that will happen to my daughter, you can not be sure what will happen with advances in mesothelioma treatments that can save you or your loved one.
This is why it is so important to always have hope.
