Ahead of Pinktober next month, our workplace “Gender Alliance” asked if they could interview me to talk about breast cancer in a work context, so today was a flurry of filming as I revisited my active treatment, now 4 years ago.
I was asked about my top tips for managers and colleagues and it really made me reflect and think quite hard, so here goes:
Supportive messages, such as “thinking of you” don't require a response and are much better than questions (how are you?) as sometimes you're just emotionally not in a place to reply.
Cancer doesn't end when active treatment finishes. A simple “how's your health” goes a long way for months and even years afterwards. Also do try (this one is for my boss) not to look surprised snd shocked when I mention my 6 monthly treatment, as I have done every 6 months for the past 3 years!
Finally, the routine and normality of work can be critical when the rest of your life is out of control, so try and allow cancer patients to work as normally as they are able to be flexible and make adjustments.
This was some of the conversation we had today in the filming and I’m looking forward to seeing the final edits and encouraging more colleagues to ensure they take good care of their health and check things out early.
