Pounding on a pillow, writing about your emotions, or talking out your feelings with a friend can help you discharge some of your anger without endangering your relationships or hurting the feelings of someone you love.

Patients often use a lot of energy worrying about what they did to cause their cancer or feeling guilt because they can't keep up with all the activities they used to do.  This guilt can be related to bargaining.  "If I eat all organic foods, I'll get well."  Their prayers may include lots of promises, "Lord, if you'll heal me, I'll never do anything bad again."  These are normal reactions, but when bargaining doesn't bring a cure, depression can set in.

Depression is more than a sad day.  It's a loss of interest in life and an inability to find pleasure.  Cancer patients have a higher than average rate of depression.  Just because the stress of cancer and its treatment makes depression understandable doesn't mean that it should be ignored.  Anti-depressants can give patients the ability to cope with their diagnosis.

These emotions are often referred to as "stages" of grief, which implies to some people that they represent an orderly progression.  In practice, not everyone goes through every stage and people may experience them in any order.  Mary, an IBC survivor, told me, "In the nearly 10 years since my diagnosis, I've gone through all of these emotions over & over again...in order, out of order, up one side & down the other. As long as I exist, I think this vicious cycle of raw emotions will continue in my world."

There is no one right way to feel about cancer, but knowing about common emotional responses can help us.  We won't take it as personally if our family members seem inappropriately angry, and we won't be embarrassed to ask our doctor for an anti-depressant.  We'll be able to acknowledge our emotions and move on to accepting our situation.