Coping With Cancer Solo: Strategies for Building Hope and Connections

Deb Krier 0:00

Deb, hey there lifter uppers. I'm Deb krier, the co host of cancer and comedy, where our mission is to heal cancer impacted people through hope and humor, something we like to call turning the grim into a grin. Well, today we're going to lean a little bit more towards the hope factor and turn a little bit serious, because we're going to be talking about loneliness in the cancer journey, particularly if you are navigating cancer alone or without a built in support system. So Dr, Brad and I are going to give you some practical ways to cope with cancer when your support system is you. So now here is the host of cancer and comedy. Dr, Brad Miller,

Dr. Brad Miller 0:40

Hey, Deb, always a pleasure, privilege to be with you and all our lifter uppers or folks out there who have decided that cancer is not going to stop you. It is part of this journey in life, and it's a bit of a detour, and it's not exactly what we've expected. We're going to keep living our life to the fullest, to the end, and whatever that means. And so that's our that's our motivation. That's what we are all about. We're here to help people to cope with hope and to to navigate the cancer journey with hope and humor. And we would really are looking to develop a real community of people who care for one another on deep levels. And so part of where we're talking about today is about our community and how we're hearing from some folks in our community and and how we just want to have this, this interplay, this exchange with people to be helpful, because that's what, you know, Deb and I have found each other. We're helpful to one another, and we've been sharing stories even today about how cancer has impacted our lives and and we want to be helpful and hopeful to one another, and we just like for people to get connected to our community. You know, community. You just go to cancer and comedy.com/follow

Dr. Brad Miller 1:46

to be a part of our cancer and comedy community. Hey, Deb, how about a couple to get us rolling here, a couple of bad dad jokes. You ready for a couple here?

Deb Krier 1:54

We need some bad dad jokes.

Dr. Brad Miller 1:56

Well, here's one for you. How do you stop an astronauts baby from crying.

Deb Krier 2:05

I don't know

Dr. Brad Miller 2:05

your rocket. Your rocket,

Deb Krier 2:09

cute, cute.

Dr. Brad Miller 2:11

What? One more here. When is an apple? A grouch?

Deb Krier 2:16

I don't know when it's a crab apple, of course. Cute, cute, oh my gosh, Gotta love those. And as you know, following our conversation, you're going to want to stick around because we will have another one of our bad dad jokes. But then, of course, we turn serious for our very serious and important faith It or Break It segment. Well, we would love for you to be part of our cancer and comedy community, where together we crush cancer with a message of how to cope with hope and humor. Please follow cancer and comedy. At Cancer and comedy.com/follow

Dr. Brad Miller 2:53

well. Deb, yeah, one of the things we talked here about building our community here, and I just think it's important, is that you know, you, I have a community of people that I

Dr. Brad Miller 3:04

am in interacting with in my in my family and in my church, and people in the cancer community, in my local community. And I know you have the same going on in your life, and you also have your try not to die dot live website and Facebook page and connecting with people there, but we are starting to hear from people who are listening to our our podcast and watching our videos and responding to what we are talking about here, because we talk about, you know, cancer impacts, really, virtually everybody does. It's either ourselves,

Dr. Brad Miller 3:42

neighbors, friends, co workers, our pets. We've been talking about that today, you and I and on our personal conversation, and it impacts us. But sometimes, one of the factors that's out there is, how do we cope with this if we don't have a community, if we're trying to face this alone or on our own, or we have, maybe, perhaps strained relationships with people in our life, or things of this nature. And so we've been hearing from some folks regarding this, and I just thought maybe you and I could respond to this whole issue of, how do we cope with cancer, how do we build basically, a support system? Or how do we cope cope with

Dr. Brad Miller 4:26

cancer when the support team is us alone? And how do we do that? I think you and I've given us some thought to this matter, because, you know, loneliness is a part of this whole process, isn't it? You know, there, even if you have a good support system, loneliness is still a part of what what we go through. And I thought you and I had some some some thoughts about this, about how we might be able to be helpful to our community and helping them to navigate and cope with loneliness, or be in your own support system, or maybe connecting up to other support systems. And so I just kind of go back and forth on this. I.

Deb Krier 5:00

A few thoughts on it, but tell me how you react to this issue, maybe some of your thoughts about how people might cope with this. Well, you know, as you mentioned, it happens, I did a Facebook post one time and about, you know, dealing with cancer, and someone who I do not know. He just responded to the post. He responded, and all he said was, I have never felt so alone in my life, and it broke your heart right now. The incredible thing was, how many people responded to him, not knowing him, and said, we can be there for you. And so I think that's maybe one of the first things. It's very hard for us to admit we need help, right? You know, where we are raised, to be independent, you know, to be strong, right? We're always told be strong. You can get through this like, you know, your coach tells you get up, tough it out. You know, whatever it is. And I think probably asking for help does not come easy for people. And I, you know, I tell people, asking for help is sometimes the strongest thing that you can actually do. It is not a weakness, it is a strength, but getting there is a challenge, yeah, and I think there's a part of this is, is to acknowledge this reality that there are a lot of people who are disconnected or alone in this whole struggle. I was happened to have a conversation with a chaplain for one of the local hospitals in my area. She, in fact, she just retired recently, and this topic came up. But a lot of times chaplains are called in hospitals and hospice situations when there's not a lot of support system that that that's there. And the reality is a lot of people have to do this because they have this kind of sense

Dr. Brad Miller 6:52

of, maybe there's not family or families far away and things like this, or they have this attitude to go it alone and to kind of be tough about it. And you just, and I just want to say that, yeah, acknowledge you're alone, but you don't have to be. It's okay to be not okay, and it's okay to to not be so tough all the time. And so you might want to reframe how asking for help is something that's not out of weakness, but it's part of a kind of the process you got to get through. You got to to kind of take the risk if you were in order to

Dr. Brad Miller 7:28

to defeat this thing, to deal with this, you got to kind of see it as a challenge. Maybe the cancer isn't cancer. Treatment isn't a weakness. It's a it's something you got to do. It's a tactical, practical thing that you have to do. It's like you kind of you, I believe you got to kind of have an intellectual part of things. You got to have the emotional part of things. You got to have a spiritual part of things. And in medical in some cases, but also relational relationships is a part of this whole process here. And so you gotta kind of you have to choose then to build a team, and do you have to be very intentional about building, building a team? And I think that's what some of us can do then, to reach out to, if you're in a hospital setting, reach out to whatever the support is there, Chaplain, social social services,

Dr. Brad Miller 8:21

social workers, things of that nature. If you're in other settings, reach out. You might even reach out to your neighbors and just, you know, make it take an opportunity to introduce yourself and say, Here's my reality. I just want to share it with you. That's my take. That's kind of what I would say to take a take Sid as a strategic opportunity to deal with your situation here, what's something else you've thought about here? You know, I think it's funny one of the times, or, you know, frequently, we find that the people who have the hardest time asking for help are sometimes the biggest caregivers, right? They're always out taking care of people

Deb Krier 9:04

they don't, you know. And so, you know, give those people a chance to help you back. I think might be the, you know, the reciprocity thing. Now, you know, don't phrase it as in, well, I drove you, so now you drive me. But people want to help, you know, and so give them the opportunity to help. You know, there are some that don't you know. I think that was one of the things that surprised me the most. But I hear this all the time. It just surprised me when I first said, Hey, I've got cancer, people that I thought would be in my tribe, in my community, supporters dropped off the face of the earth, and it really but I have heard many other people that's something very common, and people that I thought didn't even know I existed said, What can we do? So I think sometimes just giving people the opportunity.

Speaker 1 10:00

Opportunity. But that's scary, right? Because what is, hey, I need help, and you get crickets, right? You know, maybe you didn't ask in the right place, maybe you didn't and I think maybe it's they need to know how you need help. I need help with somebody driving me to treatment once a week, right? Right, be specific. Be specific, you know. And give that the chance. If you are somebody who is part of a church community, I mean, and you can obviously address this, there are so many ways that your church community can help out, you know, and and so give them that chance. You'll give, you, like, taking care of people, so give them the chance to help you back. Yeah, and I think it's not only limited to church community. What I mean by that, maybe it's your workers or former co workers, or perhaps it's other organizations. Maybe you were a veteran, or maybe a part of a of a organization, you know, like a service club or something like this. It's okay to ask. I think some people kind of approach things, and I know I've had some of this on my own people, my own life, in my own world, my own family, even myself. At times, say I don't want to bother somebody else, you know, I don't want to bother somebody else with my needs, or I'm going to burn out my relationships or my friendships and that kind of things. Well, I just think we need to give those people an opportunity. As you said, you had some people who kind of backed away and said no, but sometimes we need to take a bit of a risk and say, give people an opportunity. Right to say no, because base, because some people will say yes, or maybe there'll be a resource to find something else. The idea here is, let's Yes, cancer is a painful thing, and it will is an assault on our senses. But we do not have to be always victimized by this, this attack. We don't have to always be the victim. We do. We don't have to struggle with this alone, and we could,

as you said, Be specific. I think sometimes people will, you we reach out to somebody or a group or something like that, or just or people know about our situation, and they say, Well, you know, anything I can do to help well, and have, maybe have a list of things, or maybe have some eggs in mind.

You know,

Speaker 1 12:22

you know, there's this vague thing, vague thing people say, let me know if you let me know if you need anything. Well, maybe have something in mind. And I think there's some things we do. A lot of it means we got to get out of our comfort zone a little bit. And, yeah, if we want to be cared for, and cancer is a crisis that we just it's very, very, very hard to do it on your on your own, and it does debilitate and do it on your own. So that's not my thoughts. What else you got? So, you know, I'm curious as to whether you think that men or people in, say, a traditional kind of masculine role, so maybe military, police officers, business leaders, you know, people like that. Do you think it's harder for them to ask for help than it is for, say, women or, you know, what do you think about that? I think as a general rule, you're that's probably true in the sense that you know, just gender roles. Traditional gender roles would say, you know, the man is supposed to be kind of tough and tough it out, and to be the be the

one who's not quite as emotional. Whereas women often have built in kind of the support system among other women, or in cases and seem to be more willing to share and things like this, and I think

that may be true. I don't want to put across the board. It's not always the case. I will share with you a story that it's always touches my heart. One of the people in my ministry was a judge in the local community, and he was known as a very tough judge. You know, he sent people to jail, and he was tough and fair was his reputation. And he

was a part of the church I was a pastor at, and delightful guy, but tough and fair. But anyhow, to get to the point of the story, he died of liver cancer. From the time he was diagnosed to the time he passed away, was about eight to 10 weeks. It was very rapid, very difficult, but in that period of time, he called to his hospital room. He's at the hospital. At the time, many people who he had relationships with, I know of in the neighborhood of 100 people. He called them and brought into his and these were people in the political world of his people he had sent to jail. They were other judges in his professional life. They were friends and family, church folks, others he brought in, and he made a point to making it right with them. Whatever it was, in some cases it was a business.

Transaction. In some cases, it was some legal thing that had to be done. In some cases, many cases, it was an emotional connection, just kind of a say goodbye or just make things right. He his way of putting it was to make things right. Judge. He was the judge to the very end to make things right. And I thought that was cool, because he didn't have to do that. And he, and when we had his funeral, that people came from, you know, the place was packed out with people who were there to share those stories about how that was done. But my point is, to your point is that men can maybe do things a little differently. Maybe it's

not sobbing in tears, but maybe it is just taking action in order to do something and to do that. And then sometimes men will often be reticent to deal with things, you know, want to kind of tough it out. You know, my,

you know, I, I'm a cancer I had was prostate cancer. And so when you deal with prostate cancer, a lot of men are really reticent to deal with matters they have to do with your sexual function and with, you know, with your incontinence and all kinds of things like it is kind of embarrassing. It's kind of goes kind of attack on your virility and all that kind of stuff. So not and I've had these conversations even with my own urologist, but how these are some things that need to be dealt with up front and out there, but I do think there are some differences there. But I think that's where it's important that we in forums like this, what we're talking about here, help people to do what you need to do, to be assertive, to care for yourself, by getting over the embarrassment, by giving getting, getting over the gender identification roles, and to do what you need to reach out. What do you think? Give me your take on that?

I totally agree, you know, and, and it's funny, because I had trouble asking for help, and now I was very open from the very start, with telling people, Hey, here's what's going on. You know, I had a, I have a Facebook group that is just for me, you know, for people who support me, I do have one at trying not to die, dot live, but I also have a personal one. And so I've always been very open with telling people what's what's been going on, but then I found it hard to ask for help. And it was so funny when I got out of I was, you know, in the hospital and and for an extended period of time, and when I got out, they had told me, you need to walk, you need to get fresh air, right? That's going to be one of the best things. But I was very unstable on my feet, so could not go by myself. So I go on, and I'm thinking, because my husband had been able to go back to work, couldn't really bother the neighbors with doing that every day, you know, all sorts of things. And so I put a post on Facebook, and I said, Help. Wanted somebody to come and walk me for 15 to 20 minutes every day. Leash provided.

So I put my little brand of humor in it, but I also wanted people to know this is not gloom and doom, right? You know, and and, and I had people who said, hey, you know, happy to come and do that. We're going to be, you know, going to be in your part of town. And there were days that I had nobody, days that I had multiple people, okay, fine, whatever. But just, but, like you said, it was asking for something specific. And that then gave people who might have thought we want to help, but we don't know how that gave them a way to help. But, yeah, I mean, it's, I'm an only child, I was raised to,

you know, to not be asking for help. And, yeah, it's, it is a challenge to do that. And I think, you know, we don't want to admit that, that we're not super human, male or female, right, right? And, and it's one thing to say, hey, we need help with, you know, fundraiser for PTA, but another to say, I need somebody to go with me to the doctor. Now, just curious about, curious about that Facebook thing you put it, was that for? Did you pay people to do that? Or was No, no, they just came. Sometimes they brought lunch. I mean, you know, some it was

really, it was, it was really, you know,

not as many as I could have used, right? So it wasn't every day, but, you know, people did, people did respond yes, and it gave them a funny way then to kind of ask how things were going, you know, and, and so, but, but, yeah, it's, it is tough and, and I think maybe we, we don't want to admit we're not perfect,

you know, whatever it is, you know, it's, it's hard for us to do that, and, you Know, and there's certainly times where we just don't have that support system.

And so that's where back to what you were saying at the very start. You know, reach out through your doctor. Reach out through, you know, their support groups the hospitals around you. And if you're in a cancer center, they have support groups. Certainly there's lots.

Things online, you know, maybe, well,

let's, let's just, let's just talk about that for a second. There is lots of things online. You have your own

web page and Facebook groups that help with that. Certainly our groups here at cancer comedy.com, and, you know, I've know there's other ones out there. There's lots of cancer related and other other elements, for that matter, type of things that are that are out there in the world. And why not just take a risk, join one or just listen in that that can be helpful to you. I know when I was first sharing about my cancer journey, there were some people came to me and the podcasting community. So they asked a whole group of basically men who are podcasters and creators out there, and they call themselves the wolf pack, and they are have a and they have a, basically an online community on Facebook and so on, the wolf pack. And so I've checked into that before, and you just can hear stories and share stories in that kind of way. Forums,

various groups that are out there. There are some

live groups. I know that I have a friend named Tim who has a Wednesday night live forum, a lot of YouTube Live group called perspectives on cancer, and I'll put links to that, show notes about about that,

and that's and that's place where you can also not only share the war stories of, hey, I got treatment in this, but Sarah, you could share life. You could share about your your family or your dog or your you know, or tell a joke or whatever. And that has some humor involved the online community,

and there is a certain level of

Speaker 1 21:47

anonymity or safety in that can be, might be a little easier, because you don't, you're not going to see that person at work or at church or wherever. Yeah, yeah. So there's that. What are the thoughts do you have? How can people can, practically, can deal with this sense of loneliness, you know. I

it is a, you know, in there are times where we're definitely alone,

you know, and and so I think it's a matter of

your mental aspect, and that's, you know, that kind of comes back to what we typically talk about, and that's something to laugh about,

you know, bring, you know, bring some humor into your life. Get out of that. Now, if it is a true depression, then please talk to your doctors about that, you know, and and because that can be, obviously, very serious. But if you know, I need to watch some big bang theory, then watch some big bang theory. There you go, you know. And, and some things like that, you know. And, you know, we I laugh that Dr Google is not your friend, but Google is your friend with something like this. And so you can type in there, you know, I just put in online cancer support groups. A lot of them came up, I'm going to encourage people to make sure it's legitimate and never, ever, ever give them money unless you have you because they, you know, you shouldn't have to pay to be part of, part of a support group.

And so there are certainly American Cancer Society, breast cancer.org,

you know, all sorts of different online communities, but make sure they're legitimate, you know, and, and, but you know, they also have other resources, you know, they like American Cancer Society has programs that can drive you, you know, now I think they work with like Uber and, you know, and so they can drive you to drive right things like that, And, and so just kind of go online, but your doctor is and, and if they have a social worker as part of their practice, they're going to be probably one of the first and best resources. Just, let's

talk about something else that I think is a part of this whole process about how you care for yourself when you're suddenly independent, or this type of thing that there may be some times that you really need to

to avail yourself of the services of other people, hired help. I'm talking about cleaning your house, mowing your lawn, grocery delivery, medical your meds, delivered and paid services. That may be what you need to do, depending on the level of your and some offer free services for people who are undergoing treatment. Yeah, there, there is that, and you mentioned,

and sometimes it's a situation where you just don't have family or friends who live nearby. Some people are isolated. I know I see this in in care facilities, you know, and there are people there. They've lived there on their own and their and their elder care facility, but their family is across the country, or whatever it is, and so they have to figure that out. And I think you mentioned something earlier. You mentioned about depression, things like that there, there may be moments when we just need to avail ourselves of counseling, and even for.

Have to pay for it. And things of this nature, there may be things that we just need to deal with with a professional as well.

And and obviously, you know, a lot of that is can be faith based. So if you are part of a even if you're not part of a church, it's okay to reach out to them and say, Hey, here's what's going on. Is there someone in the in the church, that can help me sure

that's true, and then you might find a new spiritual home that's right? Something else I think we could do sometimes, and this is, have to be kind of when we pay attention and are aware notice things is, you can start to develop what we call micro connections, or moments of joy or pleasure. You know, I get I one that I do locally is I go to a local coffee shop most mornings, and, you know, they've just got a little bit of there's usually one or two familiar faces in there, the barista type people who are in there. And they become familiar faces. And I know that my name, and they know me by name, by my orders and what I like, the way I like my coffee. And we just have a moment. And sometimes they'll kid around by whatever I've got on my T shirt. I talk about how they've got their hair done, or whatever it is. We have some fun with that. I'm just talking about support groups, support connections that you can make, that can brighten your day. And look for those so it might be people you interact with your life. It might even be a Facebook thing or a text thing, but look for ways that you can kind of update certain connections with people that can bring you some joy, and you don't know where those come from, right? I recently lost a friend. Now it was, you know, heart disease and so not cancer, but you know that this happens, but my and it was my friend's husband, and every day for breakfast, they went to McDonald's and sat there, read the newspaper, right every day. And so the McDonald's people knew them, knew they were friends. Well, all of a sudden they stopped going in, right? And they don't know how, but those, one of the McDonald's employees, tracked down what had happened. Now, they had not published an obituary, yet, they had not done anything. And so somehow they figured it out, and had a large bouquet of flowers delivered to the house, wow. And I know I get chills right now just thinking about that, right? And so, you know, we kind of got to talking about that, and we thought we need to do something to back with them. And so several of us went together and bought a whole bunch of $10 McDonald's gift cards. Wow. And, you know, wrote a note with with each of them. And so it's breakfast on Bob,

you know. And obviously they, you know, they could go to any McDonald's, but, you know, the people at this specific McDonald's know that when they get the breakfast from Bob, that's what's going on. And they went to the, you know, their their local VFW, they went to some churches and gave those out, you know. And so it was kind of a pay it forward moment for us.

Well, that that's awesome. I think something else we could least be mindful of is how we can savor and enjoy and even maybe find some humor in being alone, you know, and to find some sense of peace about being alone and deal with things. This doesn't mean to just wallow in your misery and dwell in your sickness or whatever it is. It may be something kind of silly, like, Hey, I don't have to fight with somebody on the TV remote, you know. I can watch what I want, or if I want to have ice cream for breakfast. I can do that. You know, I can do these things I don't want to. We don't have to have a committee or whatever to do, do things or a family meeting. We could do some things here, or we can, you know, that we could do some things here, that

humor doesn't fix loneliness. It just helps us to kind of cope with this, a little make things, life a little more bearable. And that's kind of what we we try to do here and, and I think that's what we're talking about here. And let's bring it to bring it around to this. And I think it has a lot to do with this that, you know, cancer is a bad deal. It sucks. It really does, right? And, and so, but we have to take some whatever our service situation is. We got to take some personal responsibility, how we deal with it, whether we're alone or with a family or with others, and kind of see that this is an opportunity. That's why I like to any challenge is also an opportunity for some new way of doing things. And the idea of what we try to do here at cancer comedy is provide some strategies, some navigation tips, some ways that you can get through your life and have a fulfilled life to the end of your life, whether that's weeks, months, years, whatever it is, but have a fulfilled life, because nobody really, really wants to spiral down into depression and spiral down.

Into a malaise there that is,

put you in a bad a bad state of affairs. We want to be that. So let me just kind of give that to you for kind of to close our conversation about how people can, you know, be kind of take personal responsibility and to live a full life, right? You know, no matter what your situation is, right, bad things happen. It's okay, acknowledge those, feel those you know, and, and, but know that you can come out of this. You can come out of it, maybe even a better person. I tell people, as weird as it is, I think cancer has made me a better person, you know, and, and, and just realize we don't know how much time we have left. You know what we you know, and, and, so how are you going to live those days, you know, do you want to live them in gratitude, or do you want to live them being Miss, grumpy?

So, yeah, you know, have those and, and, you know, you mentioned micro steps. Think about, you know, what are those, those little things of gratitude, you know, you're in the middle of this. Okay, hey, I went more than two hours without throwing up. Yay.

Small wins. Yeah, whatever it is, you know, find those micro things of gratitude and build on those and write them down so that when you've got more icky days, go back and look at those and see that. Yeah, it's it's okay. And I just would share this one more thing, and then I want you to close this out. We're here at cancer and comedy. Yes, Deb and I are real people going through real cancer situations, and we have chosen, among other things, to deal with it together and the partnership in this podcast and with the folks we like to call lift our uppers. And we call people that because we are we depend on one another to help lift each other. Up, lift up one and one another. And so we want to be a source of encouragement. And we want you to know you can reach out to us through our website, cancer and comedy.com, or other means you can email us, and we, Deb has her own website, live, try not to die. Dot live, and you can do those things as well. We are here to not only to be a source of information, but all an inspiration, perhaps would be a source of community. And we hope you will take take advantage of that. You know, I couldn't say it better. And yeah, we are here, and please don't think you would be bothering us, or that you don't know us. That's okay. Maybe that makes it easier. But yeah, reach out to us, because we are here and we are happy and and you know, very willing to help with whatever you need.

Well, I think this has been very serious, right, so now we really need one of our bad dad jokes of the day. You.