I was struggling to find something to write about tonight until I had a conversation with my friend, Mark, who mentioned Sara Douglass had been written up in The Sunday Times in Perth. You might remember Mark, he wrote about the tenth anniversary of Crusader. You can find the pdf of the article here.
Douglass is a very vocal person and brought up a wonderful topic for discussion. Basically, she’s dying of cancer and has been virtually deserted by so many people who do not know or understand how to deal with really bad ill health. They do not understand the pain levels and certainly do not understand the exhaustion levels. Douglas wrote about this on her blog and as at this time there are 81 comments. It is a very big topic and one I can totally relate to, not that I have cancer or any kind of illness such as that but I have had my share of health challenges and do have a number of allergies and intolerances. Whenever I’ve spoken of my health challenges over the years I’ve always felt that people don’t want to know the details and so I’ve picked up the habit of trying to only talk about them when it’s necessary, such as when ordering food. I can’t begin to understand how much harder it must be for someone like Douglass who needs to not only stop talking about it but also comfort those around her who are not sick.
I read a related article a while ago by Lionel Shriver who not only has her own health challenges but spent a lot of print time saying mea culpa. Her very good friend was dying and she kept on putting off contacting her as she couldn’t deal with her friend denying her impending death. I read that and thought, mea culpa I am guilty of the same thing. I do try, if I know someone is nearing death, to actually go and see them to make my goodbyes, but I have never said to them ‘what can I do for you?’ I have never asked them if there was anything I could do to make things easier for them and I rarely visit them before they get to that point.
In her blog Douglass apologises for being inconvenient and I have this to say to her. ‘Sara Douglas, I would love you to continue to be inconvenient, you have provoked much discussion and that is a healthy part of this society. You are a wonderful person and you have brought a very large problem to our notice, it is similar to the one I have been pondering since reading Lionel Shriver’s article and you have voiced everything I’ve been thinking and so much more. Not only that you have voiced it in much better language than I ever could. For that, I thank you.’