I wrote a piece a few weeks ago railing at the app-heavy facelessness of dealing with the NHS about what I believe is known as one’s care pathway. My point was that it might be efficient if reducing head count in admin departments is what counts as efficiency, but not if clear communication is the aim. The whole palaver of the comms around the journey to diagnosis was more of a drama than the diagnosis itself, which was for a very mild variant of skin cancer. As fond as I am of a wallow in self-pity and catastrophisation, even I couldn’t get myself into a panic over this. So I certainly wasn’t courting sympathy or concern by making too much of it, and I was as careful as possible to get this across.
But then a couple of media outlets ran clickbait-type headlines along the lines of AC REVEALS HE HAS CANCER. And everything went nuts; thoughts and prayers came streaming in from all quarters. There were family and friends – to whom I’d not mentioned it because I didn’t think it merited a mention. There were people I’d not heard from in years.
Initially, I was just embarrassed. Then I got a bit annoyed – had no one got beyond the headlines and read any of the actual articles, which all made it clear it was nothing serious? And then I felt bad about feeling annoyed because people were only being nice.
And still the thoughts and prayers came in – from a beleaguered family I know in Jerusalem, and from friends whose lives have been – or are – on the line with more serious forms of cancer. And the more I protested that it was nothing, I started worrying that it might be something after all, as if everyone knew something I didn’t.
I went to see West Brom play at Queens Park Rangers. In the pub, a huge, rather dangerous-looking bloke clasped my hands in his, looked me in the eye and said he’d be praying for me in church on the Sunday. A bloke running a burger van said, “I’ve been through it, mate. Terrible.” The poor man had been really very ill indeed with bowel cancer. I did my best to summon words to convey compassion without implying I was remotely in the same boat. But then perhaps, in the nicest possible way, he drew some comfort from having me in the same boat.
It was a lot. I still feel bad about the fuss. But most of all I am grateful to be living in what feels like a caring world. And I wish everyone a very happy Christmas.
Adrian Chiles is a broadcaster, writer and Guardian columnist
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