Just a Warrior geeking about language
When I was learning my dodgy version of Spanish I found a phrase I really connected with. "Tener ganas" was more than it's loose translation of to want something. It was like a desire, a feeling inside of craving a thing. At least that's how it was described to me. I loved it. I didn't just want to go to the pool when it was 38 degrees, I craved it. I didn't just want to go out dancing, I desired it. My friend and I loved it so much we incorporated it into our bastardised Spanglish vocabulary with sentences like "I've got ganas to...". It really meant more to us than to just want.
Language is a wonderful thing. I'm a geek and enjoy the affect language can have when it comes to communicating a point or painting a colourful story. So, yup, I'm blogging about language today. Geek away.
As you probably know I inadvertently joined the cancer club almost three years ago now. It was a giant oops in my life but here I am in a club nobody ever wants to be part of. It's come to my attention that there's some pretty horrible language being used in this society. I'm not talking about F- bombs, I'm all good with them. I'm talking about limiting and pain inflicting language.
Let's start with the one I hate with the most passion. Suffer. If anyone says I suffer from cancer I'll be seriously considering making them suffer. I don't suffer. Don't get me wrong, this deal isn't exactly a walk in the park but I don't suffer. I don't spend my days wallowing in grief and hoping this ordeal will end. An end for me might mean death and I'm cool with avoiding that for a bit longer. Since I started hanging in Cancer Club I realised how often it's used with illness, even mild ones. I mean I agree if we were saying I was suffering from nausea today, I bloody wish that would end. But saying a person suffers from an illness they live with each day is underestimating the person and their ability to get on with things others may not be able to comprehend.
I live my life. I live my life with a lot of enthusiasm. These days, that life involves treatments, pain, illness but it's still a really good life and I certainly hope those aren't the things a person sees when they look at me. So I'm not suffering by being alive. I'm living. Living with unpleasant things and yet still living very happily.
If I hear the phrase, "They suffer from...." I will ask, "According to who? How do you know they're suffering?". The only person who decides if they're suffering is the person with the illness.
How we view cancer is a really personal thing. We all find our own ways of processing it. I don't believe that this cancer belongs to me. I kind of see it as a sneaky enemy infiltration, as you may have gathered from my blog on immunotherapy. So this is not MY cancer. I don't own it. It's not a part of me and I can happily live my life without it, should it fancy buggering off. I feel that saying it's mine is like giving it permission to stay when I'd really rather it left. I have considered the idea that it may not leave and I'd prefer to see that relationship as harmonious flatmates as opposed to one being, you know, like couples who share a Facebook profile. I'm all about being me not being part of an inseparable duo. So I insist that this term isn't used in my case. It's the cancer. The cancer that I have. I'll correct slips of the tongue because it's important to me, and if something is important it's cool to communicate that.
Apparently, the ultimate goal in cancer club is to become a survivor. This is the greatest feat. The black belt. The Heavy Weight title. The Webb Ellis trophy (I hope my English friends get that reference, you almost had it).
I'm not sure I'll ever be a survivor. Once this bugger got into my liver and lung nobody was putting bets on me. In fact me being alive now is already a challenge to the statistics. So surviving isn't really my jam. I'm fighting it instead. Just because I don't get the survivor title doesn't mean I won't have fought bloody hard or lived with enthusiasm.
For me, survivor sounds passive anyway. I'm not a particularly passive person, never have been. I'm definitely not passive where cancer is concerned. I've decided Cancer Warrior sums me up well. It works while I fight and will work if I can evict this freeloader. I will forever be a warrior now, whether I have cancer or not. I am a warrior because I fight. Even when I've reached the real lows, when I've been resuscitated or I'm in a wheelchair or I can't even keep water down, I insist on receiving every treatment. There is no pain too strong to stop my fight to live. I may never get to be a survivor but I'm already embracing the Cancer Warrior title.
It's not just cancer club that has some foul language either. Some of us aren't very nice when we talk to ourselves. We use all sorts of nasty words. I've just declared myself a Cancer Warrior so don't feel embarrassed to tell yourself how great you are either. If we tell ourselves we can't, we aren't good enough, we're fat or not pretty enough, not smart enough, we might just believe ourselves. That's not cool. We're all good enough. Please, please remember to remind yourself of just how wonderful you are.
I like having my own mind. I have never liked being told what to do. Don't ever ask me if I'm allowed to do something because I have cancer; I can do whatever I like. The question is whether it's recommended. Like most people, I imagine, I used words like need to, have to, must or should. Now as someone who likes to have their own mind it sounded very much like I was following someone else's agenda. I'm not sure whose but, since I don't like doing as I'm told, I didn't like the fact that I was making myself conform to some mystery being. I'm not a master of this but I've been making a really big effort to change this language. I do things because I want to. Even when they don't seem that desirable, if the outcome is then I want to do them. I want to stay alive so I want a needle stuck in my chest and a foreign substance pumped in my body. Actually I'm pretty pumped about it when the desirable outcome is the potential to stay alive. Life is seriously rewarding when you realise you're doing things because you want to and not out of obligation to some unknown being.
So my fellow Warriors of so many varieties, if you fancy it, start thinking about what your language is doing for you. Feel free to change it. We're all in control of how we want to see the world and our language is a key part of how we build that.
Language is a wonderful thing. I'm a geek and enjoy the affect language can have when it comes to communicating a point or painting a colourful story. So, yup, I'm blogging about language today. Geek away.
As you probably know I inadvertently joined the cancer club almost three years ago now. It was a giant oops in my life but here I am in a club nobody ever wants to be part of. It's come to my attention that there's some pretty horrible language being used in this society. I'm not talking about F- bombs, I'm all good with them. I'm talking about limiting and pain inflicting language.
Let's start with the one I hate with the most passion. Suffer. If anyone says I suffer from cancer I'll be seriously considering making them suffer. I don't suffer. Don't get me wrong, this deal isn't exactly a walk in the park but I don't suffer. I don't spend my days wallowing in grief and hoping this ordeal will end. An end for me might mean death and I'm cool with avoiding that for a bit longer. Since I started hanging in Cancer Club I realised how often it's used with illness, even mild ones. I mean I agree if we were saying I was suffering from nausea today, I bloody wish that would end. But saying a person suffers from an illness they live with each day is underestimating the person and their ability to get on with things others may not be able to comprehend.
I live my life. I live my life with a lot of enthusiasm. These days, that life involves treatments, pain, illness but it's still a really good life and I certainly hope those aren't the things a person sees when they look at me. So I'm not suffering by being alive. I'm living. Living with unpleasant things and yet still living very happily.
If I hear the phrase, "They suffer from...." I will ask, "According to who? How do you know they're suffering?". The only person who decides if they're suffering is the person with the illness.
How we view cancer is a really personal thing. We all find our own ways of processing it. I don't believe that this cancer belongs to me. I kind of see it as a sneaky enemy infiltration, as you may have gathered from my blog on immunotherapy. So this is not MY cancer. I don't own it. It's not a part of me and I can happily live my life without it, should it fancy buggering off. I feel that saying it's mine is like giving it permission to stay when I'd really rather it left. I have considered the idea that it may not leave and I'd prefer to see that relationship as harmonious flatmates as opposed to one being, you know, like couples who share a Facebook profile. I'm all about being me not being part of an inseparable duo. So I insist that this term isn't used in my case. It's the cancer. The cancer that I have. I'll correct slips of the tongue because it's important to me, and if something is important it's cool to communicate that.
Apparently, the ultimate goal in cancer club is to become a survivor. This is the greatest feat. The black belt. The Heavy Weight title. The Webb Ellis trophy (I hope my English friends get that reference, you almost had it).
I'm not sure I'll ever be a survivor. Once this bugger got into my liver and lung nobody was putting bets on me. In fact me being alive now is already a challenge to the statistics. So surviving isn't really my jam. I'm fighting it instead. Just because I don't get the survivor title doesn't mean I won't have fought bloody hard or lived with enthusiasm.
For me, survivor sounds passive anyway. I'm not a particularly passive person, never have been. I'm definitely not passive where cancer is concerned. I've decided Cancer Warrior sums me up well. It works while I fight and will work if I can evict this freeloader. I will forever be a warrior now, whether I have cancer or not. I am a warrior because I fight. Even when I've reached the real lows, when I've been resuscitated or I'm in a wheelchair or I can't even keep water down, I insist on receiving every treatment. There is no pain too strong to stop my fight to live. I may never get to be a survivor but I'm already embracing the Cancer Warrior title.
It's not just cancer club that has some foul language either. Some of us aren't very nice when we talk to ourselves. We use all sorts of nasty words. I've just declared myself a Cancer Warrior so don't feel embarrassed to tell yourself how great you are either. If we tell ourselves we can't, we aren't good enough, we're fat or not pretty enough, not smart enough, we might just believe ourselves. That's not cool. We're all good enough. Please, please remember to remind yourself of just how wonderful you are.
I like having my own mind. I have never liked being told what to do. Don't ever ask me if I'm allowed to do something because I have cancer; I can do whatever I like. The question is whether it's recommended. Like most people, I imagine, I used words like need to, have to, must or should. Now as someone who likes to have their own mind it sounded very much like I was following someone else's agenda. I'm not sure whose but, since I don't like doing as I'm told, I didn't like the fact that I was making myself conform to some mystery being. I'm not a master of this but I've been making a really big effort to change this language. I do things because I want to. Even when they don't seem that desirable, if the outcome is then I want to do them. I want to stay alive so I want a needle stuck in my chest and a foreign substance pumped in my body. Actually I'm pretty pumped about it when the desirable outcome is the potential to stay alive. Life is seriously rewarding when you realise you're doing things because you want to and not out of obligation to some unknown being.
So my fellow Warriors of so many varieties, if you fancy it, start thinking about what your language is doing for you. Feel free to change it. We're all in control of how we want to see the world and our language is a key part of how we build that.
Just a Warrior geeking about language
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