First impressions count....

…. but aren’t always right!

Hands up … who amongst us judges others on their first impression of them? If we’re honest I think we all do to some extent.

I should know not to really, considering I have great fun changing the impressions people make of me!

Roll back the clock to diagnosis day. Everything happened backwards anyway, secondaries were diagnosed first, the next day the primary was confirmed and then in to the office of the last person to be introduced, the Breast Care Nurse (BCN).

For the past six months I’ve wondered if I was just unlucky. Everyone has raved about the BCN allocated to them. How helpful they are, understanding, always on the end of the phone. That first day, Mr BF and I sat opposite a specialist nurse, there to help us process and deal with the horrendous diagnosis and prognosis that had just landed in our laps and she had tears in her eyes when there were none in ours! The “helpful” literature presented to us was useless and only served to reinforce the message that I had bypassed the hoped for intervening “healthy” years between primary and secondary diagnosis. Didn’t this nurse understand what a secondary diagnosis meant? I guess she did, why else were the tears there? Surely this wasn’t how every new patient was received?

Shove the clock forward again to last week and there’s me, sat at the kitchen table with a friend, enjoying a cup of tea and a fair bit of chattering! It just so happens that this friend is a doctor. For whatever reason the conversation turned to nurses, specialist nurses in particular and how Dr. M thought that they were quite useful people particularly when things needed doing and questions needed answering. The story was told of the teary eyed BCN. Now Dr M is a straight talker if ever I saw one and a very competent doctor. She’s also a wife and mum and an incredibly caring person. She asked how I feel when her eyes fill up. Well that’s ok isn’t it? She’s a friend first and foremost, she knows me well and knows my family. I can accept and understand if her eyes fill up! Then she added that on occasion she has shed a tear for a patient, touched by their story or situation. No different to reading a book, watching a film or listening to music ….we can all find ourselves filling up at unexpected moments.

Now I feel guilty. I’ve judged this nurse because she is human. What right do I have to decide that because the nurse had shown her emotions that she was somehow less able to do her job? How do I know what has happened in her life that may have affected her that day?

With Dr M’s words swimming about in my head, I buried my first impressions and telephoned the nurse. After apologising profusely about possibly giving her the impression that her help and advice weren’t welcome we started again.

I now understand the role she is willing and able to play in my life. She now knows that my acceptance of my situation and fate is genuine and not a state of hysteric denial.

We will work together from here on in. As she said, she is officially my advocate and will do all she can to assist me. I suppose that makes me officially her patient …. I hope she isn’t expecting a model one!!

First impressions do count but there’s no shame in changing your opinion!