Accept, respect and dose

Having a disease, or suffering from it, entails much more than the disease itself. You learn a lot about yourself, your body and mind, about the people around you and about the disease you are dealing with.

The cancer, unfortunately, was not the first major illness I had to deal with. For three years I had a (severe) depression. A mental illness, something that cannot be seen on the outside and which unfortunately many people still don't understand. With any disease it is difficult to put yourself in the position of the “patient” if you have never had to deal with that disease yourself. And even if you are familiar with the disease, everyone is different and a disease can also progress differently. You can try to get a picture of what that is like for the other person by listening to his/her story, asking questions or looking for information. I am very open about my illness. It helps me to talk about it. It struck me, especially during my depression, that people can react very differently. One hears your story and asks questions, at another you notice resistance. I don't want to judge what this is about, maybe disinterested or too confrontational, not knowing how to react or just having enough of your own life. And that's fine, I've also had moments when I just couldn't take it to hear the nice or less nice stories from other people.

During the depression I learned that a difference between a depression and a burnout is that with a depression you have the physical energy but no desire to do anything and with a burnout you have the desire but not the physical energy. I knew that but I couldn't quite imagine what that must be like. Until after surgery and radiation treatment for the cancer, I suddenly no longer had the physical energy, but I did have the desire to do things. You have to learn to deal with your physical or mental limits. During the depression, everything that gave mental stimuli was quickly too much, but being physically active was nice and good. But now after the treatment of the cancer I am reaching my physical limits. Tiredness, quickly suffering from an irritated or dry trachea with exertion and a bad condition. I have to relearn my limits and respect them. Learning is done by trial and error and in some cases accepting that things are not going the way you want.

For a long time I noticed that cycling is actually too heavy: cycling on a bridge, keeping up with the children or having a headwind. So more and more often I take the car because cycling is no longer pleasant. And I find that difficult, I've been doing almost everything by bike for years and now I can't do that anymore. Every now and then the thought came up to look for an electric bicycle, but I didn't want to give in to that. That feels like failure to me. Now I can see it differently. It no longer feels like failure but accepting that my boundaries are different and I need help. Help in the form of pedal support so that I have some freedom back. The freedom to move without a car, to be outside and enjoy all the beautiful things. You come by bike to completely different places than by car and with that your world becomes a bit bigger.

This is perhaps the biggest lesson that being sick has taught me: my boundaries are not fixed and can move for various reasons. You can challenge yourself by looking for your limits, but sometimes you also just have to accept that something is not going the way you want, respect that the limit is there for you and dose in what you can do in one day.

I enjoy my great "cheat bike" and will try to take the car every now and then or plan a day of lounging on the couch; accept, respect and dose.