Things That Trialvilly Annoy You.

Adverts.ie at the moment. Seems a lot of loopers have found my ads.

More upset than annoyed and not so trivial.

The radiology department in my hospital has installed a bell. I’m so disappointed that they have done this, though I’m also surprised at how much it has upset me. The whole idea of the bell is that a person rings it at the end of their treatment. It’s symbolic. I’m sure people are wondering what the problem with that is. Well, for many people, the radiation therapy they receive is merely palliative, to beat back tumours for a while or relieve symptoms. They’ll never finish treatment. Those bells are so in-your-face. Now I’m fearful that the onc day ward, which I attend, will install one. I don’t know how I’ll handle hearing that bell maybe a few times during my visit, knowing I’ll never ring it myself. I contacted the hospital to voice my concerns and got a reply back saying “the bell gives people hope!”. I was thinking “What about those of us for whom hope is lost?”.

I know I sound curmudgeonly here, but I just find the whole idea so insensitive and tone-deaf. There are plenty of ways to celebrate, surely! But it’s something you can’t publicly criticise. You’ll be excoriated! I’ve even seen terminal cancer patients being rounded on and accused of envy for criticising the bells. Of course they’re envious, they’d give anything to recover!

Widdershins wrote: »

Seems really thoughtless, just as you wouldn't celebrate right in front of other patients in any other way, knowing others were at different stages and having different outcomes

I feel like sensitivity in hospitals is something every adult should just know about. When we were kids, if we were visiting somebody in hospital, my folks would always remind us to be mindful of the other ward occupants as you never know what anyone else is going through.

For me, hospital is a mental trial. Treatment day is very draining, both physically and mentally and something like a bell would send me batty. I’m crossing my fingers that one won’t be installed in the onc day ward because it will be very hard to get rid of once it’s there. The patients there are in all kinds of conditions. Imagine that bell ringing beside somebody who isn’t feeling well and has a poor prognosis? I can’t believe this idea ever caught on but it’s part of the inane positivity culture that surrounds cancer. Nobody considers the terminal patients’ feelings because nobody wants to acknowledge that we exist, let alone that we have feelings.

I knew I had to stop reading below-the-line comments on Facebook the day I saw an advanced cancer patient being rounded on for explaining why so many of us hate the bells.

And it’s not that I don’t want other people to recover, it’s that I want to also and that ringing would be a cruel reminder that it will never happen.