Staying 'up'

When I heard recently that a friend had been diagnosed with cancer, my immediate reaction was to send sympathy and advice to keep his spirits up.

That's what people have been telling me for close to three months now, and I greatly appreciate such sentiments, especially as I realize more each day how difficult it is.

Like most health issues, I suppose, cancer has an unrelenting aspect to it that has to be faced every day - indeed almost every minute of every day. Facing it with a positive, can-do attitude all the time is, in my experience, impossible.

Sometimes when I'm having a bad day or get some bad news, I just feel like breaking down, and I do. I have cried more in the last three months, I suspect, than in the last 60 years. ( I was a colicky baby)

But that release helps me to regroup and then try to stay positive most of the time, especially since I'm blessed with sympathetic shoulders to cry on. Bouncing back is important because there's a widespread consensus in the medical community that attitude directly affects how the body fights cancer and other problems.

The mind-body connection was once disputed, but, from what I've been told, no more. Staying positive is probably the most important, and one of the most difficult, things a cancer patient has to do.

The ultimate goal, as one well wisher put it today, is to have this time some day to be a "dim but formative memory.'' Amen.