Support Group

I joined a support group through the One in Nine organization and the weekly meetings began a few weeks ago. Strangely, I was first interviewed by the two social workers for suitability; apparently, having had cancer does not automatically qualify one to join a support group. From among the seven or so women who apparently also passed muster, I was particularly struck by the wide range of cancer experiences. Three of them have had radical mastectomies - one woman, with a tumor half the size of mine, but with a higher oncotest rating, had opted for chemotherapy and a full mastectomy.

This is the first time I’ve joined a support group and I wasn’t sure what to expect. The overall rationale is that as fellow sufferers, we can say things to each other that only we can understand or appreciate. Now, after four or five meetings, we’ve exchanged our cancer stories and added some personal information. The social workers, who monitor the meetings, occasionally pipe in with an observation or two. I’m not sure what their role is; whether it’s to guide our chat in a certain direction, to summarize what we’ve talked about in order to draw conclusions or if they are just there to lend an air of officialdom to the proceedings. Some bonding should be taking place and indeed some of the women have formed friendships ‘after hours’, but at the last meeting I had an acute feeling that, as a group, we really didn’t have that much to talk about.

Unfortunately, I know enough women with whom I can discuss the different angles of our cancer and even those friends who have not personally experienced the disease are there for me to offload an angst or two. Add to that the fact that I don’t get home until after 10.30, I have good enough reasons to consider resigning.