Episode 020: Psychological Repercussions of Cancer
Jun 07, 2018•36 min•Transcript available on Metacast Episode description
Today, I’m talking to Christoffer, he’s an expert in psychosocial cancer research and we take a plunge into the deep and murky waters of the psychology of cancer, the psychological repercussions of cancer on you and those you love. Here is what we cover:
How diagnosis can change the way you see yourself
Evidence that psychological stress does not cause cancer
The impact of mindset on survivorship
Social factors that play a huge role in our approach to treatment
Dealing with 3 major late effects that come with cancer
The need to treat cancer as a collective disease
and much, much more!
Links
Christoffer Johansen's Research Profile
Episode 007: How To Use Your Inner Resources To Better Deal With Cancer
Episode 016: Your Survivorship Blueprint
Full Transcript
Joe: Hey, this is Joe Bakhmoutski, and welcome to Simplify Cancer Podcast.
Joe: Christoffer, you know cancer changes the way other people see you. That can have a huge negative impact on how you see yourself. What’s your perspective on that?
Christoffer: I think that most of the reasons why other people are changing their point of view on a person who has been diagnosed and treated for cancer, is that it raises fears about dying and you are suddenly close to a person who you know is undergoing a really severe treatment, which is life threatening, and you are mirroring yourself in this person. Therefore, you are actually getting afraid, not that you are going around with an epidemic, speaking on an infectious disease that you in some ways feel the vulnerability of this person. It’s in a way transferred to yourself. Therefore, you think that is the reason why, or that is some of the reason why there is a change in the interaction between the people that are dying from cancer and their close relatives and friends and colleagues and so on.
Joe: You think it’s they are afraid of dying themselves?
Christoffer: In a way, their fear of dying, which is a constant issue that we’re talking with is becoming more realistic, so to speak, in a cancer patient, but it is also mirroring out or spreading out in the closes surroundings as a phenomenon. One of many phenomena that is close to cancer disease.
Joe: Yes, absolutely, Christoffer. What about the self-image? What about how the people see themselves? Do you notice that people who are cancer patients and cancer survivors, do they start to see themselves in a different way and perceive themselves to be different and behave in a different way, the way they are out in the world?
Christoffer: We know from some of the scientific studies, that there is some degree of self-stigmatization that’s coming along with a cancer diagnosis. First of all, you can imagine that those patients having a cancer, which we know is closely related to lifestyle, for example. Let’s say, lung cancer is associated with smoking, we may feel guilt, ascribe the guilt to their own behaviour. Therefore, feel that they are the reason why they have cancer.
I know that there are several places where people who have lifestyle associated cancers are asking for treatment time slots, which is in the early morning or late afternoon, not to meet other patients and to tell them which diagnosis they have and what they are treated for, because they are afraid and do not feel that they can stand up for the diagnosis that they have, because it’s clearly mostly associated with lifestyle. For that reason, that is an example of change.
There are also these diseases where you hardly lose control with some of the vital functions. Let’s say you get a colostomy or you get a prostate cancer, so you don’t control your urination as well as you did beforehand. Then these diseases, you also see a kind of a social self-isolation because it’s difficult to do down to the supermarket or be in company with other friends or conduct activities...
