The Fine Art of Doomscrolling After Cancer Pt 1

Don’t. Just Don’t.

I think it’s safe to say that most of us developed a doomscrolling habit during COVID. Was “doomscrolling” or “doomsurfing” even in our vocabulary prior to COVID?

According to a quick search, why, no, it wasn’t. Since the early 2020’s, there have been plenty of hot-to-handle topics that keep us refreshing the page to watch for the latest developments. (Like that’s going to effect any change in the situation.)

Negativity bias is real. I’ve heard it explained that our brains are like Velcro with negative things and Teflon with positive things. This is why we obsess over bad things while the happy, positive things slide right off like an egg in those miracle frying pan commercials.

It’s also why it takes several positive things to outweigh the one negative. Another distinction is that for the positive to take hold, we must focus on those things for several seconds. But noooooo! We’re busy refreshing our screens and confirming to our beleaguered souls that the world is going to hell in a handbasket. And there’s not a damn thing you can do about it.

And let’s not forget that Google algorithms will assist you in confirming your darkest fears by selectively showing headlines and articles to fuel the negativity.

It’s real. And mental health care workers see the effects of this every day as it exacerbates depression and anxiety.

After cancer, I’ve discovered my doomscrolling tendencies have switched focus from politics and the legion global crises to something even more terrifying: Cancer recurrence.

Olivia Newton John’s death highlighted this. She had a 30-year history with breast cancer before passing away at 72.  

The headlines sent me down the rabbit hole.

What was her initial stage? Was it in her lymph nodes? What were the tumor characteristics? Why did it come back? Did she drink enough carrot juice? Not enough kale?

My head felt like a Gatling gun question firing questions, my anxiety growing with each one.

Welcome to cancer doomscrolling. But let’s get a little background first.

Cancer doomscrolling starts pre-cancer diagnosis when a suspicious area is first noticed on imaging. It’s probably nothing, but we need to take a closer look.

Hello, Google. Yeah, it’s probably nothing you tell yourself. For breast lumps, the vast majority of them are benign. Nothing to see here, move along!

But we’re off to the races. You get a report stating you have dense breasts. Yeah, tell me something I don’t already know. But they want to squish the girls again in a diagnostic mammogram. This is when you discover your ta-ta’s are capable of all sorts of configurations and gymnastics.

They want a close look, and a close look is what they’ll get.

Oh shit. The closer look now shows the need for a biopsy. When the doctor tells you this, you know from the doctor’s sober poker face that this is merely to cinch the diagnosis.

Googling picks up new fervor. You read PubMed articles. Mayo Clinic is now bookmarked on your favorite website bar. You read blogs entitled “My breast cancer journey”–provided the woman is still alive and well.

This is serious shit. You dig for more statistics. Most of them are favorable. But do you think that is what a frightened woman focuses on?

Hell no. By the time the word biopsy has entered the conversation, you’ve already pictured yourself boobless, bald and emaciated from cancer treatment. In a nanosecond.

Memories of Aunt Matilda’s diagnosis and subsequent demise drift through your mind. You recall the card passed around at work 15 years ago sending condolences to the Sally’s spouse, that upbeat gal in accounting who “lost her battle to breast cancer” and left behind young children. She was brave, that one. Lasted 3 years, the rumors went. Even worked up to her final months. RIP, dear Sally.

The onslaught of terror cannot be understated.

The mental energy it takes to stay positive under this stressful scenario is Sisyphean. Possible negative outcomes are screaming, drowning out any voice of reason.

What is the life expectancy? Am I going to die this year? Is that twitch in my toe due to metastases?  MY GOD IS THIS FRECKLE CANCER?!?!

The run-away freight train is picking up speed, down barreling down the track and you feel helpless to do anything.

This is the part where my pink sisters stepped in. At this stage, I didn’t know that I would join their club as a pink sister, but I found great comfort in talking to survivors in my circle of friends and family.

I got my club invite when the biopsy came back via the patient portal “Invasive Ductal Carcinoma.”

I knew it! screamed my negativity bias. I was not one of the relieved women who were told all is well, see you next year.

Terror-stricken, I am now on a fast track to my Google School of Medicine MD training complete with residency in oncology. My nursing background gives me a head start, right?

With shaking hands, I am holding the pathology report, wondering what the hell all the results mean. The only thing I am certain of is now my research needs to include finding an oncologist.

OMFG. Just the word “oncologist” upped my blood pressure, I’m sure.

This is a slow-moving night mare. But yet it also feels like all my fears… of suffering, of cancer, of death, of an unlived life… have been put into a blender that is now whirring them at high speed, with the lid off. (Clean up on aisle four!)

Fear is splashed everywhere. It’s dripping off the ceiling. Scattered across the floor. There is a menace in my bra.

Make an appointment with an oncologist, I tell myself.

Amazon now knows I have breast cancer and the books it now recommends reflect this.

Fuck off, Amazon. And take all the cancer books with you.

I am in the Pink Sister Breast Cancer club. NO. NO. NO. I didn’t sign up for this fucking club. GO AWAY. I’ll be fine.

I’ll just take me and my cancerous boob and run away.

But I can’t because it’s a cancerous boob and I don’t want to die. I have shit to do. A life to live.

Doomscrolling has picked up a life of its own now. The biopsy shows the tumor is “slow and lazy” as a nurse friend put it.

I put “slow and lazy” plus breast cancer into a search engine. I research survival statistics. I look up what looks like Greek on the pathology report. What the hell does THAT number mean?

With my limited understanding, I am able to grasp that I will probably not die in the next week. And it’s clear this medical degree thing may take some time.

Actually, overall favorable treatment numbers are high.

Research and treatment have come a long way, even in recent history.

But do you think reading this calms my racing heart or interrupts my memorial service planning?

NoooOooooooOooooo.

“Would you like to be on something for the anxiety?” the oncologist would ask me at our first consultation.

Uh, that would be a HELL YES. I am completely gob smacked. I need help.

Angels begin to surround me. The nurse navigator. Pink sisters. Loving friends. The doctors and other medical staff.

A new thought enters my head. Maybe, just maybe, I’ll get through this.

It’ll be better once you have your treatment plan in place, I’m told. The waiting is the hardest.

I write these assurances in my daily journal. I write them on fluorescent sticky notes and slap them all around my home.

YOU WILL BE OKAY.

Let’s find out what we’re dealing with and form a plan of action.

And then Mayo Clinic takes a deeper look. The nurse recognizes my terror when they scrutinize the other breast during the ultrasounds.

Oh my god, I say, tears brimming. I know what this means; I tell the nurse. My thoughts are at warp 10.

I hate this fucking pink gown. I hate pink. I hate the stupid posters admonishing us that early detection saves lives. I hate the pictures of the smiling woman getting her boob squished in the mammo machine. I hate hospitals. I hate all this shit.

The nurse interrupts my internal monologue. “This is Mayo,” she says. “We are thorough.”

I’m equally terrified and comforted.

But any sense of comfort evaporated when the doctor enters the room. His expression was sober.

“I’m afraid the ultrasound is showing spots in the other breast as well. We will need to do more biopsies,” he says, placing a hand on my arm.

The tears start flowing.

Congratulations, Theresa. For all your attempts at looking at the bright side, you have just now entered the 4% Club. That’s the likelihood of cancer being found in the contralateral breast at the time of diagnosis. Four percent.

This cancer was giving me a BOGO deal. Fuck you, cancer.

Now, statistics give even less comfort. I even grasp at some and say to the doctor, without conviction, “There’s still a chance it’s not cancer though, right?”

His face tells me what I need to know. “The biopsy will tell us more,” he replies.

Conflicting emotions once again.

I want to take him by the shoulders and shake the stuffing out of him until he deems everything normal in boob-land.

I also want to hug him and sob and ask him to repeat to me I’ll be okay.

He tells me this is a bump in the road. You WILL be okay, he says. These are tiny spots, he says. But there are three of the little mofos, I want to scream. One, Two, THREE. THREE!!!

He shows the spots. It resembles a constellation. And the NorthStar is pointing to more cancer.

“Do you mind if I give you a hug?” he asks. I gather that damn pink gown around me and throw my arms open wide.

Please, I reply.  

To be continued because this is one long ass article…