Stress, well relatively speaking...

On Wednesday I received a message from a very old friend and ex colleague. She overcame breast cancer some 24 years ago, but sadly the cancer has returned . Within the tissue around the site of the radiotherapy.

Ironic that the cure that had helped her heal had damaged the tissue and given cancer access to grow. At first this devastating news seemed very uncertain; operation, skin graft, chemo, radiotherapy.. uncertain!. But by Thursday with MRI and . scan results, it was clear that the cancer was localised and thankfully had not spread.
It's at these times you understand the meaning of 'stress'. This family have already stared into the abyss of cancer, grappled with the treatments and the fear. It seemed so unfair that they, and, in particular she, should have to face the ordeal again That's stress!

Then there was Friday morning, something and nothing in the light of all the procedures over the last eighteen months, a simple dentists visit. I'd been in August, have always maintained regular checks, but had a niggling tooth....maybe part of a filling missing I thought. Unfortunately seems I have a badly decayed molar, below the gum line and an extraction is necessary. Silly, its only an extraction, been there before, but it just got to me. Maybe its past experience; dental surgery, a broken jaw, but more self pity....my stress bucket overflowed. Single stress, not the real, double hard fear, sleep stealing with your face hard against the wall...bit it got to me.

Then Friday evening came and the news broke of the carnage on the streets and in the theatres and restaurants and bars of Paris. Innocent people, enjoying a night out, relaxing, suddenly had their life cut short, their friends and family devastated and a nation in morning. Stress on a national & international scale.

Now the thing with stress is its relative. That little word, so readily used, is always, always relative. Yes my friend is in a difficult place and has to undergo surgery and skin grafts, her family have weeks and months of worry. And yes my minor dental anxiety has to be dealt with.

But for all those families scarred forever, damaged; all those relationships destroyed, hope ended...a very different dimension to stress. We all need to remember our relativity, consider the fairness and analyse the depth.. it still feels overpowering, overwhelming and debilitating, but at least today we can get up and move, we have actions we can take.
In Paris some innocent people have lost that choice, they will never get up and move again.