In describing living at this Hope Lodge, I'm tempted to fall into a cliche and tell you that people from all walks of life are here as they are going through their cancer treatments.
But that wouldn't exactly be true; for instance, there aren't any kids living here, since families in that tough situation have access to the Ronald McDonald house. I've noticed that there aren't any really elderly people in residence either. Some retirement-age folks are here, but mostly of the "young" old set, if you know what I mean.
I wonder about the "middle" old or the "old" old who are diagnosed with cancer. Maybe they aren't so likely to be prescribed long courses of treatment away from home in the first place. Or maybe they do receive these recommendations, but it's just harder for them to pull the logistics together to carry the whole thing off. I don't know what the reasons are for sure; I just know that much older folks aren't living here right now.
I'm guessing, too, at least from how people describe themselves, that there aren't too many extremely well-to-do patients and their caregivers here. After all, really affluent people could just book themselves into a snazzy hotel near the hospital. In fact, as I type, these rich folks are probably in these fine hotel suites right now, eating bon-bons delivered by room service and stretching out on 600-thread count sheets. (Not that I envy them. Rich people who have cancer still have cancer.)
My impression is that most residents are not from the other end of the socio-economic spectrum either. It's hard to get access to long-term treatment if you don't have health insurance. Actually, readers of this blog will remember that it isn't all that easy to get into treatment even if you do have insurance.
A few folks have made it here without jobs and insurance, a real miracle in our culture and economy. They have pulled this off thanks to the zealous efforts of some social workers or other providers who helped these families with the heavy lifting needed to get here and get going with surgery, chemo, regular radiation, proton therapy or a potpourri of the same.
But most people here, at least at from what we've seen so far, are closer to our demographic, i.e., middle-aged couples who were busy in our jobs before cancer dropped a bomb in our lives. Some of the other couples are younger and still have kids at home. I'm really feeling for them, having to leave their children with other relatives for months at a time. Most, though, have grown kids, so there is less stress on that front.
There are some other combinations, though, of patients and caregivers, like mothers who are here in support of their adult sons, sons who are here as the caregivers for their mothers, ditto for fathers, daughters, etc.
The writer in me would like to give more details about our fellow residents, but I'm mindful that, while a blog is hardly a HIPAA-protected environment, these people probably would rather not have their lives trotted out on the internet right now. So, with regrets, I'll just be vague about where our co-residents are from, what they do for a living when they aren't here, and what cancer has done to their lives.
As you might imagine, we are hearing stories, sometimes as small groups sit down to watch a movie or work on puzzles in the living rooms, but more often when people gather in the kitchen to put together meals or just grab a cookie.
Not all of our conversations as we are stir frying the veggies are about cancer. Sometimes people just chat about the news or something they've seen on TV or, for the more able-bodied, where they went after their treatment sessions at the hospital. But a good share of the time, pairs or little groups of people are standing at the counter chopping onions or perched on the stools with a cup of coffee and talking about how that diagnosis got made--often with an emphasis on how long it took to get it right--or they are detailing what the chemo or the radiation treatments have been like for them. There is a lot of conversation about how to cope with side effects--Acquafor seems to be a hit for dealing with proton therapy sunburn, for instance--and how to communicate with the doctors.
But the most popular topic of all?
The date when you get to go home. The hands-down fav subject, bar none.
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