Tag: Conditioning

Peace In Puzzle Pieces

One unexpected thing that had a big influence on me in terms of feeling support from others was a jigsaw puzzle in the oncological radiology’s waiting room. It was a large puzzle with a lot of pieces. Every day for six weeks, as I received radiation treatment, I saw that puzzle in various stages of progress. Eventually, I started poking around at it, and often I would be able to add a piece or two. The next day I came, more would have been completed — seems like a lot of us were poking!

This served as a lovely metaphor for what we, as patients, were going through: cancer is a puzzle, and treatment offers pieces that we put together in hope of finding our way through. All of us were working on this jigsaw puzzle at different levels of ability. Some were stronger than others, some had better support networks, but everyone was shuffling along at their own pace, completing their treatment puzzle, piece by piece, day by day. On days when treatment seemed never-ending, there was gratification to be found in the progress of the jigsaw puzzle.

I had never realized that working on jigsaw puzzles was so soothing. Just as in mindfulness meditation where you focus on the breath, the puzzle offers an opportunity to focus on a particular pattern, color or shape of a piece. It requires concentration, but this concentration comes easily. You don’t have to make yourself focus, it simply happens as you search for a piece.

Eventually, my radiation treatment ended and I left a partially completed puzzle in that cozy waiting room for others to finish, but I longed for that familiar feeling of comfort and quiet. That waiting room had been an inviting sanctuary where my only responsibility was to practice self-care. I wanted that to continue. It wasn’t long before I’d found puzzles to work on at home. I chose the images for how they made me feel, and for quite a few months afterwards, working on puzzles was a meditation. My family played the role of other patients, and together we enjoyed the satisfaction of putting the pieces together.

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Here are several of the puzzles I/we finished at home. Apologies again: as with most other photos in this blog, I never intended to post these online, so the photo quality is lacking. I’ve added info on where these puzzles can be found in case anyone is interested, especially if you’d like to see what the pictures look like under ideal conditions.

“Secret Garden” by Alan Giana (Bits & Pieces, 500 pcs, Amazon.com): I was looking for a peaceful oasis and this image fit the bill. I loved the flowers and flying creatures, but particularly the koi, which brought a special zen to the picture. (Bad lighting – doesn’t do it justice!)

Summer_Puzzle

“Marvelous Garden” by Oleg Gavrilov (Bits & Pieces, 500 pcs, Amazon.com): I love peacock blue, the architecture smacked of Tuscanny and the flowers (yes, pink ones) completed the scene. This remains my favorite puzzle to date.

Peacock_Puzzle

“Autumn Oasis II” by Alan Giana (Bits & Pieces, 500 pcs, Amazon.com): Autumn means that Halloween/Thanksgiving/Christmas are coming up soon, and after such a miserable year of fear and cancer treatments, I was so looking forward to a joyous holiday season.

Autumn_Puzzle

“Florence” by Eric Dowdle (Dowdle Puzzles, 500 pcs, dowdlefolkart.com but purchased at Costco): I missed visiting Florence during a European trip due to scheduling conflicts, but it remains one of my most-wanted cities to tour. Seeing Michelangelo’s David in person is on my bucket list! I particularly liked that this puzzle came with a little poster of the image that made putting it together a serene pleasure. The last thing you want is to get headache trying to match up teeny windows!

Florence_Puzzle

The Problem With Pink

The breast cancer awareness movement has done a good job of bringing cancer awareness to the forefront. Especially in October, which is Breast Cancer Awareness Month, it’s hard to see pink without thinking of breast cancer. This is particularly true for someone who has gone through cancer treatment, but I expect that many who haven’t strongly equate the color with the cancer too.

Certainly, it doesn’t hurt to distribute pink “Save the Boobies”-esque stickers, t-shirts and wrist bands. It’s acceptable to say “boobies” in polite company, to broach the subject of women’s health, and this push to pink-out everything has resulted in more funding for cancer research. People probably think it’s cooler to have “boobies” on your wrist band than something like “Save the Pancreas”, the cancer of which has a much higher mortality rate. But a pancreas doesn’t look as good in a bikini top.

There is a darker side to this, and it has nothing to do with the usual arguments against pinking everything out, which tend to be about companies making profits at the expense of women. This is about what it feels like to be diagnosed with breast cancer.

At some point, awareness hits a saturation point. I’m willing to bet that many women who have been diagnosed with breast cancer dislike the color pink on some level. The diagnosis is life-disrupting if not traumatic, and the constant reminder from all the pink ribbons and other paraphernalia can get nauseating. And I do mean that in a physical sense. For me, diagnosis = anxiety; anxiety = nausea; pink = breast cancer…well, math was never my strong suit, but this all adds up to pink = nausea.

As I sat alone waiting for my surgery, feeling very nauseated, my Nurse Navigator paid me a visit. Incidentally, these nurses are the greatest thing since sliced bread (probably even better!), as they are a knowledgeable liaison between the patient and everything medical. In any case, my nurse brought me a goodie bag. Yes, it was pink and it contained various useful items relevant to my surgery and future treatments. And yes, most of these items were pink too. I guess these days it’s hard to justify using any other color if you’re talking breast.

But there was one thing that was not pink, and it’s because it wasn’t pink that I realized right then and there what sort of a visceral response I’d been having to all the pink stuff. It was a soft and springy heart-shaped pillow to be placed in the armpit to comfortably support the affected arm after surgery, and it was purple. Okay, with pink accents, but close enough. It was PURPLE!

PurpleHeart

This is a good place to mention that I make strong associations between emotions and my environment. This is a form of contextual conditioning. I’m sure I’ll write more about that in the future, but for now, I can tell you that having something not-pink that I used daily until my incisions healed, and having it be completely relevant to breast cancer treatment…but again, not-pink…actually took the edge off my anxiety. I was more likely to reach for it because at a time when I needed to relax and recover, the color didn’t remind me of my cancer.

That may sound unbelievable, but contextual conditioning is like that. I love that pillow and I love that it’s purple. And it’s really pretty amazing how my brain perceives that squishy little purple pillow as being so nice to have around. Don’t think I would have had the same response had it been pink.