How am I angry? Let me count the ways.
The other night, I was trying to explain to my dad how I sometimes try to make myself angry on purpose.
“So,” I said. “I’ll just go to the Facebook page of a person I don’t like, or I’ll read the comments on a news article, and chances are, there’ll be something there that will make me really mad.”
“Why would you do that?” he asked.
“Well…” I said, really considering the question. “I’m mad most of the time anyway and this just gives me somewhere to direct my anger.”
I didn’t realize it was true until after I’d said it.
*****
Of all the emotions I feel every day (and, oh boy, do I feel ALL OF THEM), anger is the hardest one for me to deal with. I’ve never been good with anger, at knowing what to do with it or letting it out in a way that feels constructive.
It used to be fairly difficult to make me angry. I was always a pretty patient person, even as a kid, and it took a whole lot to make me really mad. Even then, I’d usually feel just a quick flash of anger that faded away before I needed to put it anywhere. As a kid, there were so many nights that I’d go to bed SO MAD at someone, vowing that I would punish them the next day by just not speaking to them. The next morning, I’d wake up and wonder what I’d even been mad about, silent treatment forgotten.
*****
The day we got home from getting The Big Bad News, that the immunotherapy had stopped working, I was exhausted from yet another day of sobbing at the doctor’s office. Joe and I both wordlessly wandered into our bedroom, where he sat down on the bed, and I stepped into the space between his knees, our ideal position for giant bear hugs. Everyone knows the best prescription for The Sads is a healthy dose of bear hugs.
But I wasn’t sad anymore. I was pissed off. So I stepped back and grabbed one of the pillows from the bed and started beating the shit out of the mattress with it. I smashed the pillow into the bed over and over, and when my fingers cramped up, I threw the pillow across the room and collapsed to the floor, finally exhausted.
In terms of catharsis, it’s not the worst thing you could do, but it didn’t feel like nearly enough destruction.
*****
I feel like destroying things almost all of the time now. I’m just so angry about my situation in general and how hard the specifics of day to day life are, when there are people who spend their lives, I don’t know, sailing around on yachts or being Padma Lakshmi. I’m angry that my entire life now feels like a struggle, like my good day is someone else’s nightmare, when there are normal people out there who get to continue living lives like what mine used to be.
I’m a mess of contradictions. I get mad at people when they ask how I am but also if they don’t ask. I’m pissed when people don’t say the right thing, or when they show me sympathy or pity and then I feel like it’s my problem to make them feel better about how shitty my situation is. “Oh, it’s not so bad!” I say, my soul dying a little inside. “I still feel pretty good/at least I can eat something/I saw a bird today, hip fucking hooray.”
I’m angry at anyone who asks anything extra of me but also anyone who acts like I can’t do something just because of my cancer. I’m angry at myself that I’m not always honest with people about how I’m doing, because when I do share all the ugly details with someone, when I don’t sugarcoat it for easier digestion, I don’t hear from them for a while. I’m pissed that it feels like all I have to talk about is cancer and yet, when people don’t show any interest in what I’m going through every day as if this ISN’T the most central aspect of my life, I’m hurt.
I’m angry at people for not being sensitive about food in front of me but then get mad if I feel like people are tiptoeing around my feelings. I’m angry at people for talking about food in front of me, to me, and especially for eating in front of me. I’m pissed that no one will ever understand what food is like for me now unless they’ve also been through this. I’m angry at people who say things like “Well, have you tried this food?” as if I haven’t scoured the entire internet for things that might be OK, or even nice, to eat. I hate that I will never eat for pleasure again and I hate having to explain that fact to people, over and over and over. (If one more person tells me how awesome it must be to be able to eat as much ice cream as I want, I’m going to smash an ice cream cone into their face.)
Currently, I’m apoplectic at the portion of the population who are trying to rush back to a normal I’ll never again be a part of. As everyone else goes back to eating in restaurants, exploring the world with a blessedly mask-free face, gathering for parties and celebrations, Joe and I are still living in our bubble. I feel trapped, unable to go anywhere without wondering if I’m putting myself at risk.
I’m angry at cancer, obviously, which is maybe the healthiest direction for these feelings to go. Why did my dumb cells do this? Why is my body trying to self-destruct, and why didn’t it respond to treatment the way it was supposed to? It wasn’t bad enough that I was going to have to live the rest of my life without food and being able to speak the way I used to AND with the specter of cancer always hanging over my head? Now I have all of that, plus incurable cancer? I WANT TO SET THE WORLD ON FIRE.
Since entering this new cancerfied world, I’ve seen how unfair cancer is to everyone it touches. Cancer doesn’t care how old you are, how nice you are, how many spiders you’ve let live in your house instead of killing them. It doesn’t care that you already poisoned your body, burned your skin away, allowed doctors to cut you open, remove pieces that are trying to kill you, and staple you back together, leaving twisted scars as the only visible roadmap to how they tried to save you. Cancer doesn’t care how mentally exhausted you are, that you haven’t been able to find your footing since it came into your life, how every time it feels like you’re finding your balance, it knocks you on your ass again.
Mostly I’m mad at myself, for not being able to just pull myself out of these dark moments. For not being able to find the joy I once did in simple activities. For not being more appreciative when people reach out or when I do have an OK day. For not being “the perfect cancer patient,” inspiring everyone around me with how strong and resilient I am, how full of life and hope even during the hardest times.
I’m angry that I’ve had to be strong when I just want to give up and never EVER go to the doctor ever again. I’m angry that I’ll have to deal with this for the rest of my life. This was supposed to be a short period of my life that would be really, really hard, but the light at the end of the tunnel was supposed to be NO MORE CANCER. Instead, the tunnel collapsed around me. There is no more light. Honestly, how am I supposed to be anything BUT angry?
But still. I hate being filled with rage all the time. I just want to find my way to some peace, and stay there forever.
*****
At my infusion yesterday, everything was running late. My appointment with the doctor, my bloodwork, my meds…everything. Anyone familiar with going to the doctor knows the impotent rage your body is filled with in these situations, but sometimes it just happens, and there’s no one to blame it on (kind of like cancer).
As I sat in my comfy chair, wrapped in my blanket, I couldn’t concentrate on any of the distractions I’d brought with me. I was too mad. I just sat there, getting more and more frustrated, when suddenly…the anger just disappeared. I don’t know how. I don’t know why. But it was just gone.
Sometimes this happens. Whatever anger I was feeling goes away with little to no effort. And as confusing as I find the angry feelings, it’s almost more confusing when they go away unexpectedly. I’m left wondering how I can make that happen when I want it to. But whatever causes it, I’m always grateful to have been taken, with no work on my part, to calmer waters. Maybe one day, I’ll learn how to get there on my own. And then? I’m never leaving SORRY I live in the ocean now.