Partner

Noun:

Either of a pair of people engaged together in the same activity.
Either member of a married couple or of an established unmarried couple.

When you first receive the life-changing news that you have The Cancer, it can almost be more difficult for your partner to come to terms with it than for you.

OK, so it’s you who has to go through all the prodding, horrible procedures and feeling like you want to crawl into a hole and stay there most of the time.

But your partner has to watch you do it.

I once was present at the birth of the son of one of my closest friends, I wasn’t supposed to be. I just popped in to see if she was OK, and she said she was, but that she was getting these really pad pains about every 10 minutes. Having only recently had my 2nd son, I suspected that given she was 9 months pregnant, this might just possibly be the start of labour.

I took her to the hospital, by which time she was about 3cm dilated. She insisted she was about to have the baby due to the amount of pain she was in. I couldn’t bear to tell her it was going to get a lot worse!

Who designed pregnancy and child birth? It must have been a man. How are you supposed to get a baby’s head and shoulders through an opening that previously had accommodated nothing bigger than a medium sized cucumber? Would be much better if we were like kangaroos, giving birth to a pea sized baby and growing it in a pocket in our tummies. Would also be so good to be able to get it out from time to time, to see how it’s cooking.

Anyway, long and short of it was the labour went on for hours. I was lactating all over the place, with my post pregnancy hormones leaking out everywhere. After many hours, they decided they would use forceps, and when they said that, my friend pushed for all her life. Honestly, there was more of her on the outside “down there” than on the inside. And in that moment, hearing her screams, I wanted to take all the pain for her and push that baby out myself.

Apart from an insane number of stitches, all was good with mother and baby, and the reason why I told that story is that for me, that was watching someone I love go through an enormous amount of pain, and I couldn’t do anything to help her apart from hold her hand, and it was extremely emotional and difficult to watch.

And that is how I think partners feel a lot of the time. If they could endure all the treatments instead of you, they would. Well, hopefully. Unless your partner is a dick.

The other thing is that everyone is always asking them how we are. Not giving a thought to all the worries your partner might be going through.

Don’t get me wrong. There were times when I wanted to head butt my other half for putting the dirty dishes on top of the dishwasher, or for not taking the bins out. And no one is a complete knight in shining armour. They have low days and sad days too. They are not always mentally equipped to deal with all of the physical and emotional dramas you are going through on a daily basis.

I have heard lots of stories about women whose partners have left them during their cancer treatment. Unbelievable. Is it for fear of having to look after someone, instead of being looked after? Man up! I mean, it’s not a great advert for finding a new partner either is it? “Why did your last relationship end?” “Well, she got cancer and couldn’t make my sandwiches any more. So I dumped her”. Class.

But if you’re lucky enough to have a partner who sticks with you, calls you Baldy-Locks and still says you are beautiful when you know you are not; who cries when you cry and makes you laugh even when you have tears and snot running down your face, then they are a keeper.